A former corrections officer who was working the night time Jeffrey Epstein was discovered useless instructed the Home Oversight Committee that her life has been derailed by threats and conspiracy theories suggesting she had a task in facilitating or masking up Epstein’s dying, in keeping with a transcript of the interview launched this week.
Tova Noel — who was initially charged with falsifying data throughout her shift that night time — denied having any function in Epstein’s dying and blamed a few of the issues that got here to gentle after the suicide on the “dysfunctional tradition” at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Heart.
“My accountability to conduct counts and rounds was improperly executed due to extreme understaffing, a scarcity of sufficient coaching, insufficient communication between administration and frontline correctional officers, and different systemic failures,” Noel mentioned in her testimony, describing her actions because the “MCC Means.”
WASHINGTON, DC – MAY 18: Former jail guard Tova Noel (C) returns from a break from testifying at a closed-door interview with the Home Oversight Committee on Capitol Hill on Could 18, 2026, in Washington, DC. Noel, a former guard on the Metropolitan Correctional Heart in New York Metropolis, is believed to have been among the many final individuals to see convicted intercourse offender Jeffrey Epstein earlier than his dying in 2019.
Andrew Harnik/Getty Photos
Noel and one other jail guard had been accused in November 2019 of falsifying data to make it appear as in the event that they accomplished their rounds that night time, whereas they spent most of their shifts at their desks looking the web. Prosecutors mentioned that due to their alleged conduct, nobody checked on the inmates in MCC’s Particular Housing Unit for eight hours, till once they discovered Epstein unresponsive in his cell.
Each Noel — who served within the Nationwide Guard together with throughout Operation Enduring Freedom in Kuwait — and the opposite guard ending up reaching offers with prosecutors and their circumstances had been dropped in December 2021.
In her opening assertion to lawmakers, she acknowledged that she submitted documentation to make it appear as if rounds and counts had been achieved; however she mentioned it was achieved firstly of the shift and mentioned the falsification of the data was not in any manner associated to Epstein’s dying and was not an try to cowl up.
Noel instructed lawmakers thought the case being dropped can be the top of her affiliation with Epstein.
“I believed that I’d have the ability to privately rebuild my life and profession. As a substitute, I’ve constantly been the topic of threats to my life, conspiracy theories, and outrageous rumors, impacting my psychological and bodily well being,” Noel mentioned, in keeping with the transcript. “I’ve acquired threats from strangers. I’ve witnessed strangers preach about whether or not I am a assassin or that I will find yourself useless. I’m constantly harassed at my residence, place of employment, in emails, and on the telephone. Each few weeks, there is a new article primarily based on a brand new principle with little to no factual foundation.”
Epstein died in jail whereas awaiting trial on August 10, 2019. His dying was dominated a suicide by hanging by the New York Medical Examiner’s Workplace, and the Justice Division concurred with that discovering.
A 2023 DOJ inspector general report detailed a number of failures whereas Epstein was within the custody of the Bureau of Prisons however concluded he died by suicide and that foul play was not potential.
The conspiracy theories flared up earlier this yr when paperwork launched by the Division of Justice included supplies from Noel’s felony case, together with the web searches she made that night time and a collection of monetary transactions flagged by her financial institution as suspicious.
Requested about each these supplies, Noel pushed again on any allegations she was concerned in Epstein’s dying and sought to clarify them as coincidences.
View of Metropolitan Correctional Heart the place accused intercourse trafficker Jeffrey Epstein died by suicide on August 10, 2019.
Pacific Press/LightRocket through Getty Photos
Requested a couple of looking historical past displaying that she searched “newest on Epstein in jail” lower than an hour earlier than he was discovered useless, Noel mentioned she was looking for furnishings on-line and was interested by one of many inmates below her supervision.
“Like, if I see it on the homepage, I click on on it and skim it. However so far as performing a bodily search, I do not recall doing that,” she mentioned, in keeping with the transcript.
A lot of the deposits to her checking account predated Epstein’s arrest. One got here 10 days earlier than his dying.
Requested about these transactions, Noel mentioned she deposited the cash herself.
“The supply of the cash that, as I discussed earlier, has nothing do with Epstein, anybody associated to Epstein, concerned with Epstein. Nobody has ever approached, provided, requested. Something that is regarding my cash has nothing to go together with Epstein in any respect. It is solely me and my private financial savings,” she mentioned.
Noel additionally denied figuring out something about an unexplained transient flash of orange seen on the surveillance digicam close to Epstein’s cell the night time earlier than he was discovered useless.
On this picture offered by the New York State Intercourse Offender Registry, Jeffrey Epstein has his photograph taken March 28, 2017.
AP
The character of the orange flash stays a thriller to at the present time, and Noel mentioned the timing of the orange flash doesn’t align with when she did her depend that night time.
“To be very sincere, I do not know what it’s, who it’s. As a result of I by no means went again to the tier, and I used to be by no means carrying something orange in any respect, and I by no means issued something orange to anybody within the SHU — not simply solely Epstein, simply anybody,” she mentioned, in keeping with the transcript.
Noel instructed lawmakers that MCC suffered a number of “systemic failures” — together with continual understaffing and insufficient coaching — and that she was by no means correctly educated to work within the unit the place Epstein was situated.
Acknowledging the errors she made that night time when Epstein died, Noel implored lawmakers that she want to transfer on and not be related to the disgraced intercourse offender.
“I want to ask the world to permit me to heal and transfer on with my life. I am not a felony. I did not conspire to trigger Mr. Epstein’s dying. It’s my want to be left alone in any case of as we speak’s interview,” Noel mentioned.
