Electric car maker Tesla CEO Elon Musk meets with French Minister for the Economy and Finances Bruno Le Maire on the sidelines of the 6th edition of the “Choose France” Summit at the Chateau de Versailles, outside Paris on May 15, 2023.
Ludovic Marin | Pool | Via Reuters
The U.S. Virgin Islands issued a subpoena to Tesla CEO Elon Musk seeking documents as part of that government’s lawsuit against JPMorgan Chase over sex trafficking by the bank‘s late longtime customer Jeffrey Epstein, a court filing revealed Monday.
That filing said the Virgin Islands has tried unsuccessfully to serve Musk with the subpoena, which was issued on April 28 because of suspicion that Epstein “may have referred or attempted to refer” Musk as a client to JPMorgan.
The USVI asked Manhattan federal court Judge Jed Rakoff in the filing to allow the government to serve Musk with the subpoena for the documents with Tesla’s registered agent.
The American territory is suing JPMorgan for allegedly enabling and benefiting from Epstein’s trafficking of young women to his private island in the Virgin Islands to be abused by him and others.
JPMorgan denies the government’s claims, which are mirrored in a separate pending civil lawsuit in Manhattan federal court by a woman who says Epstein sexually abused her.
A May 4 court filing by the USVI revealed that the government had issued a similar subpoena on Google co-founder Larry Page.
The territory previously issued subpoenas to Page’s fellow Google co-founder Sergey Brin, former Disney executive Michael Ovitz, Hyatt Hotels executive chairman Thomas Pritzker and Mort Zuckerman, the billionaire real estate investor.
In Monday’s filing, the USVI said, “Upon information and belief, Elon Musk — the CEO of Tesla, Inc., among other companies — is a high-net-worth individual who Epstein may have referred or attempted to refer
to JPMorgan.”
The government said that it had hired an investigative firm to try to locate an address from Musk, and also contacted one of his lawyers.
That lawyer in past federal cases has waived the requirement of him being personally served with legal documents, according to the filing.
“The Government contacted Mr. Musk’s counsel via email to ask if he would be authorized to accept service on Mr. Musk’s behalf in this matter but did not receive a response confirming or denying his authority,” the filing said.
CNBC has reached out to request comment from Musk. In addition to being CEO of Tesla, Musk is head of SpaceX and owner of Twitter.
JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon is due to be deposed for both lawsuits beginning on May 26.
Epstein, a former friend of Donald Trump Bill Clinton and Prince Andrew of Britain, was a customer of the bank from 1998 through 2013. In 2008, he pleaded guilty to a state charge in Florida of soliciting sex from an underage girl.
Epstein killed himself in a Manhattan jail in August 2019, a month after being arrested on child sex trafficking charges.
A video still from the NBC archive showing Donald Trump talking with Jeffrey Epstein at a party in Mar-A-Lago from 1992.
NBC
