JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said he was “so sorry” that his Wall Street bank ever did business with convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and that the relationship hurt its brand “a little bit.”
The nation’s largest bank has been embroiled in a legal battle with the US Virgin Islands, which wants JPMorgan to pay at least $190 million to resolve a lawsuit accusing it of enabling Epstein’s sex trafficking.
“We banked Jeffrey Epstein and I’m so sorry that we did. I wish we hadn’t,” Dimon said in an interview with CNBC on Wednesday.
“Had we known then what we know today, we obviously wouldnt’ve,” added Dimon, who said in a deposition in May that he never had any dealings with Epstein, and didn’t even know the sex offender was a JPMorgan client until his 2019 arrest.
Epstein, who committed suicide while awaiting trial in 2019, was a JPMorgan client from 1998 to 2013.
The financier was a client in 2005 when Palm Beach police began an investigation into reports that Epstein molested a 14-year-old girl; in 2006, when he was arrested on a single count of soliciting prostitution and sentenced to 18 months in prison; and in 2011, when he was registered as a level three sex offender.
When CNBC interviewer Leslie Picker asked if the bank’s tie-up with Epstein has impacted JPMorgan’s brand, Dimon said “A little bit, sometimes.”
“Yes, we make terrible mistakes sometimes and we apologize for it,” he added.
Representatives for JPMorgan declined to comment beyond Dimon’s interview.
It was Dimon’s second mea culpa in less than a week. He made similar comments in an interview with Bloomberg last Thursday.
The Virgin Islands filed a motion for summary judgment in the US Southern District of New York last week.
The court filing pointed to Epstein’s deep ties with the Wall Street institution’s top bankers, including the current CEO of JPMorgan’s asset and wealth management division, Mary Erdoes, and Jes Staley, a former top lieutenant at the bank.
Dimon has maintained his innocence throughout the case, instead pointing fingers at Staley, who was the CEO of JPMorgan’s Asset Management division in 2004, when Dimon first joined the bank.
Staley, however, has contradicted the claim, admitting that he and Dimon did, in fact, communicate about Epstein in 2006, when Epstein was first arrested, and again in 2008, when he pleaded guilty or soliciting and procuring a minor for prostitution.
Staley and Dimon were colleagues at JPMorgan until 2009 when Staley left to head up Barclays.
Staley was ousted from his role as Barclays CEO in November 2021 after it was revealed that he exchanged around 1,200 emails with Epstein during his time at JPMorgan.
The ex-JPMorgan executive is also facing a lawsuit from his former employer for allegedly “personally observing” Epstein as he assaulted his sex-trafficking victims and failing to disclose information to his bosses about the illegal venture.
In the documents, the bank wants Staley to be on the hook for damages incurred as a result of JPMorgan’s litigation related to the Epstein case — a sum that likely totals more than $80 million.
Though Dimon has been questioned as part of the US Virgin Islands’ case against JPMorgan, he is not personally facing any litigation.
