On November 30, Donald Trump outbids Jeffrey Epstein for the Maison de l’Amitie estate in Palm Beach, Florida. The auction is believed to be the beginning of the end of the criminals’ friendship.
Attorney Paul Krasker initially offered $35 million to buy the property in September. Epstein stepped in and offered $36 million, without the fees Krasker requested. With support from the estate and creditors, a court approved Epstein as the legal “initial offerer” months before the auction. Trump swooped in.
Public sightings of the two together ended in 2004, when nursing home magnate Abe Gosman’s Palm Beach mansion, named the Maison de l’Amitie (The House of Friendship), came on the market in a bankruptcy auction. Both Trump and Epstein wanted the six-acre oceanfront estate for themselves, the Post reported.
Joseph Luzinski, who was the property’s trustee, told the paper that both men started lobbying him and would talk behind each other’s back.
“It was something like, Donald saying, ‘You don’t want to do a deal with him, he doesn’t have the money,’ while Epstein was saying: ‘Donald is all talk. He doesn’t have the money,’ ” Luzinski told the Post. “They both really wanted it.”
Insider
Message pads obtained by Vice show that Trump called the sex trafficker at least twice in November. The first call came between November 11 and November 16. The second call came between November 16 and November 20.
Trump adds a coat of paint to the mansion and sells the property to a Russian oligarch for much, much more than its estimated worth. Money laundering? Trump tells Michael Cohen he thinks the oligarch is working for Vladimir Putin.
Other people connected:
Three attorneys represented Epstein in the auction. One was Andrew Kamensky. An attorney speaking for Trump at the auction, with Trump on speakerphone at times, was Raymond Royce.
Epstein’s mentor and very likely co-conspirator Les Wexner bought the property in 1985. Three years later, Wexner sold the property to nursing home magnate Abraham “Abe” D. Gosman. Gosman was the last owner before Trump.
Previous owners of the property include Dun & Bradstreet family member Robert Dun Douglass, oil tycoon Harrison Williams, and oil executive Charles Bierer Wrightsman.
Note: A previous version of this post said the auction date was unknown. Court documents suggest the auction took place on November 30, 2004. Please contact Trump File if interested in this and other documents not available in the links below.
External Sources
Insider (Archived)
Vice (Archived)
Esquire (Archived)
New York Times (Archived)
Washington Post (Archived)