(ZH) — Jeffrey Epstein’s former cellmate has asked a New York judge to move him to a new prison after he says prison guards have been threatening him in the wake of the registered sex offender’s death, according to the New York Post.
Hulking ex-cop Nicholas Tartaglione — who briefly bunked with Epstein at the Metropolitan Correctional Center — has been told by various guards there to “shut up,” “stop talking” and “stop complaining,” as questions swirled about how the accused sex trafficker was able to commit suicide in federal custody, Tartaglione attorney Bruce Barket says in a letter to White Plains federal Judge Kenneth Karas.
Tartaglione was sharing a cell with Epstein during what’s believed to have been the 66-year-old’s first suicide attempt, on July 23. The two were separated before Epstein hanged himself on Aug. 10. –New York Post
Epstein told his lawyers that Tartaglione had “roughed him up” according to a previous report by the Post. The ex-cop’s lawyer, Bruce Barket said in response “I do know that Nick was not brought up on any charges at all in the institution, so they cleared him.”
In his request for transfer, the 51-year-old Tartaglione said he was told there would be a “price to pay” if he talks about Epstein’s death.
“The clear message Mr. Tartaglione has received is that if he conveys information about the facility or about [Epstein’s] recent suicide, there will be a price to pay,” reads the letter from Barket. “Whether or not the investigators into the suicide chose to interview Mr. Tartaglione about the attempted suicide to which he was witness or about how the facility is run and the conditions under which the inmates are forced to live, the correction officers know he has information potentially very damaging to the very people now charged with guarding him or their coworkers.”
Barket also decried the “deplorable” conditions at the Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC), including “a serious rodent and insect infestation.”
Tartaglione faces the death penalty for his alleged involvement in four drug-related murders. Feds claim the ex-cop and an accomplice lured Martin Luna to a Chester, NY lounge to find stolen cocaine money and instead ended up killing Luna and three other men he had brought for protection.
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