By Jack Phillips
Contributing Writer
A federal judge in New York ordered on Wednesday the release of a suicide note that purportedly was written by convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein before his death in August 2019.
The note was allegedly found by Epstein’s former cellmate after his first suspected suicide attempt in jail. It was made public for the first time on Wednesday, unsealed by U.S. District Judge Kenneth Karas in White Plains, New York, in response to a request from The New York Times.
Nicholas Tartaglione, the cellmate, who is a former police officer serving a life sentence for the murders of four people, mentioned the note in an interview with The New York Times. He claimed he found the note after Epstein, who was awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges at the time, was discovered on the floor of their Manhattan jail cell in July 2019 with what he said was a bedsheet around his neck after a failed suicide attempt.
Weeks later, on Aug. 10, 2019, Epstein was found dead in his jail cell. Officials ruled that his death was a suicide.
“They investigated me for month — found nothing!!!” the purported Epstein note reads, which includes illegible text in some areas. “It is a treat to be able to choose” the “time to say goodbye,” it also says. “Watcha want me to do — Bust out cryin!!”
“No Fun,” the note concluded. “Not worth it!!”
The note wasn’t mentioned in the lengthy government reports that were released about the circumstances of Epstein’s death, nor did it surface in the Department of Justice’s recent release of files on Epstein and accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell to comply with a recently passed law.
Speaking to The New York Times, Tartaglione claimed that the note was stashed away in a graphic novel after Epstein was taken out of their cell the first time he allegedly attempted to take his own life. He said it was scrawled on a piece of paper taken from a legal pad.
“I opened the book to read, and there it was,” he told the outlet, adding that he gave the note to his attorneys because he believed it would be helpful if Epstein had claimed he tried to harm him.
Tartaglione first made mention of the note during a podcast interview in July 2025, saying that he believes Epstein killed himself.
“My lawyers at the time wanted to make sure, you know, I didn’t write it,” Tartaglione said during the podcast.
According to jail records, Epstein had friction marks and skin irritation on his neck from the suspected July attempt. Jail officers said he was breathing heavily but responsive. One officer reported at the time that Epstein said he believed Tartaglione had tried to kill him, according to a memo included in the Justice Department’s files.
Jail officials then put Epstein on suicide watch for 31 hours after the incident before downgrading him to psychiatric observation. But Epstein, in the jail records, denied trying to harm himself, telling a jail psychologist that suicide was against his Jewish religion and that he was a “coward” who didn’t like to feel pain.
In its request to the judge on Wednesday, the NY Times lawyers wrote that they were seeking to unseal judicial records and wanted the court to “immediately unseal the suicide note purportedly authored by Jeffrey Epstein and reportedly submitted to the Court by Mr. Tartaglione’s attorneys.”
That same day, Karas, who had overseen Tartaglione’s criminal case, issued an order granting the NY Times’ request.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
