When former New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas began his investigation into Jeffrey Epstein’s activities on Zorro Ranch, he never expected it to come to a grinding halt just as it began. But that’s precisely what New Mexico’s former top law enforcement officer says happened as he began to probe Epstein and his sprawling New Mexico property.
In 2019, Balderas was six months into an investigation and had just interviewed one Epstein survivor.
That’s when he said he heard from federal officials who said they were also looking into Epstein.
“We were immediately contacted by a whole legal team in New York, asking us to pause our investigation,” Balderas told the Scripps News Group during an interview in May.
He obliged, saying the feds had “the bigger hammer at the time” and had agreed to share evidence and coordinate their efforts.
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Records obtained by the Scripps News Group show that over a year of federal discussions about Zorro Ranch took place that excluded New Mexico authorities. The correspondence shows the FBI acknowledged it never searched Epstein’s New Mexico property even as federal prosecutors moved toward closing Epstein’s case.
Inside the emails
One email thread begins on Aug. 16, 2019 — less than a week after Epstein’s death. It’s from an unknown sender requesting a meeting with the Southern District of New York on “[New Mexico]-related Epstein matters.”
Another email on a separate thread dated Aug. 22, 2019, from then-Deputy Director of the FBI David Bowdich, highlights the media attention surrounding the fact the FBI had not yet searched Zorro Ranch. Bowdich wrote, “I am sure there is a good reason.”
The records raise a troubling question: if federal agencies were discussing the New Mexico property, why wasn’t anyone working together to investigate it, and what might have been lost as the trail went cold?
Scripps News reached out to the Department of Justice to discuss the emails but did not hear back.
Feds never searched Zorro Ranch
Federal authorities say they couldn’t search the ranch because they didn’t have probable cause. Balderas called that notion “alarming.”
“So, on the one hand in the summer of ‘19, you’re asking me to slow down and pause, but the very same fall of that year, the FBI is confirming they hadn’t gathered enough evidence to gather a search warrant ... they could have called us back, and we could have gladly helped them secure a warrant,” Balderas said.
In the same email thread in which Bowdich wrote about the ranch not being searched, it states the Southern District of New York will abandon the Epstein case entirely.
Balderas blindsided by federal authorities' decision
Balderas says he was not told about the decision to abandon the case.
"I’ve never seen this before where an agency doesn't share their true motives and the evidence that they currently have,” Balderas said.
The Southern District of New York formally closed the sex trafficking case against Epstein a week later.
Balderas said he was kept in the dark for all of that and re-upped his offer of support in a letter dated Sept. 17, 2019, but he never heard back.
“Their silence really had me believing that they were going to be in aggressive prosecution,” Balderas said.
His office tried reaching out again nearly one year later, days after Ghislaine Maxwell’s arrest in 2020. They offered resources to investigate both Epstein and his co-conspirators.
Again, he never heard back.
“They failed as a prosecuting office and an investigative agency to collaborate with other law enforcement,” Balderas said. “There definitely was withholding of information in our investigation. A real question is why? I do believe we experienced some of the first signs of the early cover-up, absolutely. And today you have a current New Mexico attorney general who is investigating, who still does not have the complete DOJ file. It's completely appalling.”
New Mexico’s current Attorney General Raúl Torrez still has not received unredacted files from the Justice Department.
Balderas says the true insights into the Zorro Ranch investigation are likely still not out for the public to read.
