Judge declines to appoint special master to oversee DOJ’s release of remaining Epstein files
Jeffrey Epstein is seen in this image released by the Department of Justice in Washington, December 19, 2025 (U.S. Justice Department)
(WASHINGTON) — A federal judge in New York on Wednesday declined to appoint a special master to oversee the Justice Department’s production of the remaining Epstein files, despite “legitimate concerns” about whether the DOJ is faithfully complying with the Epstein Files Transparency Act.
The Dec. 19 deadline the law imposed for the release of all files related to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has come and gone, and at least two members of Congress say the Justice Department is still in possession of as many as two million potentially relevant documents.
Federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York said last week they’re still reviewing and redacting material from the investigations into Epstein and co-conspirator Ghislaine Maxwell to comply with court orders about protecting victims.
Several Epstein victims wrote letters supporting legislators’ push for a neutral monitor.
In his opinion released Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer said the “questions raised by the Representatives and the victims are undeniably important and timely” and raise “raise legitimate concerns about whether DOJ is faithfully complying with federal law.”
However, the judge concluded he lacks jurisdiction to supervise the Justice Department’s compliance with the Epstein Act.
“The Representatives have not articulated how the criminal statutes under which Maxwell was charged would empower the Court to enforce the EFTA,” Engelmayer wrote.
The opinion also said the members of Congress — Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif. — have no role in the matter.
“The Representatives do not seek to opine on any live issue before the Court,” Engelmayer wrote. “And the appointment of a neutral to supervise DOJ’s compliance with the EFTA is far afield from any matter pending before the Court.”
Congress passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act in November, following blowback the Trump administration received seeking the release of materials related to their probe of Epstein, who died by suicide in a New York jail in 2019. President Donald Trump signed the act into law on Nov. 19.
Materials released to date include a trove of photographs and court records, including a complaint to the FBI about Epstein that was filed years before he was first investigated for child sex abuse, and documents containing previously unknown details about plans for Epstein’s 2019 arrest.
The files released so far, however, have yet to show evidence of wrongdoing on the part of famous, powerful men, against the expectations of many of those who have been pushing for the files’ release.
Liam Conejo Ramos, as he is detained, January 20, 2026 in Minneapolis, Minnesota. (Columbia Heights Public Schools)
(MINNEAPOLIS) — An immigration judge has denied Liam Conejo Ramos and his family’s asylum claim, their attorney confirmed.
The 5-year-old boy and his father, Adrian Conejo Arias, were detained on Jan. 20 by immigration agents in Minneapolis and held in a Texas detention facility. A judge ordered them to be released and they flew back to Minnesota on Feb. 1.
Attorney Danielle Molliver told ABC News on Thursday the family was unable to present any evidence in the case before the government filed a motion to terminate the case which a judge granted. Molliver said she has filed an appeal with the Board of Immigration Appeals.
“We understand that this decision will be appealed and remain hopeful for a positive outcome,” a spokesperson for Columbia Heights Public School District said earlier in confirming the asylum claim denial. “The detention in January of Liam and his father shed light on the harm caused by Operation Metro Surge, during which many children and families have been detained.”
The boy and his father were detained in January shortly after arriving home from the child’s preschool, school officials had said.
Both were taken to a federal detention facility in Dilley, Texas. They had a pending asylum case but no order of deportation.
The five-year-old’s father told ABC News last month that he wants to remain in the United States with his family, saying they fled Ecuador out of fear.
“I asked for asylum to be here for my family, for my children,” Conejo Arias said. “I’m here because I’m scared of returning to my country.”
In a statement after a judge ordered them to be released, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said, “The facts in this case have NOT changed: ICE did NOT target or arrest a child.”
“On January 20, ICE conducted a targeted operation to arrest Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias an illegal alien from Ecuador who was RELEASED into the U.S. by the Biden administration,” McLaughlin said. “As agents approached, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias fled on foot — abandoning his child.”
McLaughlin said ICE officers remained with Liam while other officers apprehended his father. Officers, according to McLaughlin, attempted to place Liam with his “alleged mother” who was inside the house, but she allegedly refused to accept custody of the child.
McLaughlin said Conejo Arias told officers he wanted his son to remain with him.
The DHS account differs from what the Conejo Arias, his family’s attorney and schools officials said occurred.
Conejo Arias said when he was detained, he was walking a few feet ahead of his son, trying to alert people who “would come out who could help” them.
“I love my son too much. I would never abandon him,” Conejo Arias said.
Officials from Liam’s school said another adult living in the home was outside begging the agents to allow them to take care of the child, but the request was denied.
Lindsey Halligan, attorney for Donald Trump, looks on during an executive order signing in the Oval Office of the White House, on March 31, 2025 in Washington, DC. (Al Drago/Getty Images)
(WASHINGTON) — In an 11-page court filing, Attorney General Pam Bondi, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche and Acting U.S. attorney Lindsay Halligan blasted a federal judge Tuesday for what they called an “inquisition” against Halligan for continuing to represent herself as U.S. attorney for Eastern District of Virginia, after another judge found she was not legally allowed to serve in the role.
Halligan, a former White House aide who was appointed interim U.S. attorney by President Donald Trump, secured indictments against former FBI Director James Comey and New York Attorney General Letitia James, only to have them thrown out when U.S. District Judge Cameron McGowan Currie determined in November that she had been unlawfully appointed without being either Senate confirmed or appointed by the federal judiciary.
Last week, U.S. District Judge David Novak ordered the Justice Department to explain why Halligan was still using the title after her office issued an indictment in which she was identified as U.S. attorney in the document’s signature block.
In their court filing on Tuesday, Bondi, Blanche and Halligan slammed Judge Novak’s order.
“The Court’s thinly veiled threat to use attorney discipline to cudgel the Executive Branch into conforming its legal position in all criminal prosecutions to the views of a single district judge is a gross abuse of power and an affront to the separation of powers,” the filing said. “The bottom line is that Ms. Halligan has not ‘misrepresented’ anything and the Court is flat wrong to suggest that any change to the Government’s signature block is warranted in this or any other case.”
“Contrary to this Court’s suggestion, nothing in the Comey and James dismissal orders prohibits Ms. Halligan from performing the functions of or holding herself out as the United States Attorney,” said the filing. “Although Judge Currie concluded that Ms. Halligan was unlawfully appointed under Section 546, she did not purport to enjoin Ms. Halligan from continuing to oversee the office or from identifying herself as the United States Attorney in the Government’s signature blocks.”
The DOJ officials said Judge Novak had a “fixation” on Halligan’s signature block, which was “untethered from how federal courts actually operate.”
They argued that the court has no authority to strike her signature from the block.
A rescue ski team makes their way to the area of an avalanche in the Castle Peak area of Truckee, Calif., February 17, 2026. (Nevada County Sheriff’s Office)
(NEVADA COUNTY, Calif.) — Eight backcountry skiers have been found dead, and one remains missing following an avalanche in California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains, officials announced Wednesday.
Search crews on Tuesday braved “highly dangerous” conditions to rescue six other skiers who were part of the same guided group, authorities said.
Crews were working on Wednesday to bring the remains of the eight dead skiers off the mountain to be reunited with their families after autopsies are performed to determine the cause of death, authorities said.
Perilous conditions near Donner Pass, where the avalanche occurred, continued on Wednesday morning. Rescuers faced a winter storm dumping more than 2 inches of snow an hour in the area, grounding rescue helicopters and hampering ground crews trying to reach the missing skiers, according to the Sierra Avalanche Center.
Tuesday’s avalanche was reported around 11:30 a.m. PT in the Castle Peak area at an elevation of 8,200 feet in the Sierra Nevada northwest of Lake Tahoe, according to the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office.
A group of 15 skiers, including four guides from the company Blackbird Mountain Guides, encountered the avalanche, according to the sheriff’s office.
“The group was in the process of returning to the trailhead at the conclusion of a three-day trip when the incident occurred,” Blackbird Mountain Guides said in a statement.
Preliminarily, the slide measured a D2.5 on the Destructive Force Scale, the avalanche version of the Enhanced Fujita Scale for rating tornadoes, meaning it was strong enough to injure, bury, or kill a person, according to the Sierra Avalanche Center. A D3 on the scale is strong enough to destroy a house.
Six people were successfully rescued Tuesday evening by search-and-rescue teams with varying injuries, authorities said. The survivors had been taking cover under a tarp when they were found alive, a source who communicated with the group told ABC News.
The survivors made a 911 call using an iPhone satellite SOS message, the sheriff’s officer said. Emergency beacons also helped rescuers find the stranded skiers, the sheriff’s office said.
“Due to extreme weather conditions, it took several hours for rescue personnel to safely reach the skiers and transport them to safety where they were medically evaluated by Truckee Fire,” the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. “Two of the six skiers have been transported to a hospital for treatment.”
Authorities initially said 16 skiers were in the group, and 10 were missing.
Rescuers faced very difficult conditions, including avalanche danger themselves, according to Brandon Schwartz, director of the Sierra Avalanche Center, which forecasts avalanche conditions in the area around Lake Tahoe. The area saw 2 to 3 feet of new snow in the last 36 hours and more was still falling at 2 to 4 inches per hour, Schwartz told ABC News.
The Blackbird Mountain Guides said the avalanche happened near the Frog Lake Backcountry Huts in the Castle Peak area, northwest of Truckee.
The group of skiers had been staying at the huts — which the company describes in online advertisements as “luxury-dormitories” — since Sunday. A 3-to-4-day stay at the huts normally costs $1,795, according to the company’s website.
The company lists prerequisites for customers, including requiring skiers to be “adept with their backcountry touring skills and have a solid foundation of touring before the trip.” Customers are also required to be in good physical shape, according to the company, “able to hike 4-6 miles and climb 1,500-2,500 vertical feet throughout the course of a day.”
The Sierra Avalanche Center said there was “high” avalanche danger in the backcountry on Tuesday, raising questions of why the group was in the rugged area.
On Monday, Blackbird Mountain Guides posted a video on Instagram showing what it described as “atypical layering from our normal mid season snowpack.”
“The result is a particularly weak layer in many northerly aspects, across various elevation bands,” a company employee said in the video. “As we move into a large storm cycle this week, pay close attention to places where faceting has been particularly strong — avalanches could behave abnormally and hazards could last longer than normal.”
The Sierra Avalanche Center said rapidly accumulating snowfall, weak layers of existing snowpack and gale-force winds that blow and drift snow “have created dangerous avalanche conditions in the mountains.”
“Natural avalanches are likely, and human-triggered avalanches large enough to bury or injure people are very likely,” the center said.
The center has issued an avalanche warning for the Central Sierra Nevada Mountains between Yuba Pass on the north and Ebbetts Pass on the south, including the greater Lake Tahoe area, through Wednesday morning.
In an updated statement on Wednesday morning, the center said, “HIGH avalanche danger continues,” and added, “travel in, near, or below avalanche terrain not recommended.”
“Increased uncertainty exists with ongoing reactivity of these buried weak layers under this large storm snow load. The potential continues for large to very large avalanches occurring in the backcountry today.”
Whiteout conditions have been reported in the region where the avalanche occurred.
The California Highway Patrol’s Truckee office warned that high winds are “creating full whiteout conditions” across the Donner Summit.
Interstate 80 over Donner Summit was closed in both directions on Tuesday and remained closed on Wednesday morning due to whiteout conditions and poor visibility.
