Jeffrey Epstein Estate Executors Reveal They’ve Worked for Years Without Pay as Legal Battles Drag On
Darren Indyke and Richard Kahn, who oversee the $630 million estate, told congressional investigators they have taken no salaries while managing the disgraced financier’s complex financial legacy.
Nearly seven years after Jeffrey Epstein’s death in a Manhattan jail cell, the two men tasked with unraveling his financial empire say they have yet to receive a dime for their work — and may never collect the millions the convicted sex offender left them.
Darren Indyke, Epstein’s longtime personal attorney, and Richard Kahn, his accountant, have served as co-executors of Epstein’s $630 million estate since his 2019 suicide. In depositions earlier this month before the House Oversight Committee, both men revealed they have taken no salaries for managing what has become one of the most legally entangled estates in recent memory.
“I am not getting paid from the estate,” Indyke said during his March 19 deposition, video of which was made public Tuesday.
The lack of compensation, they told investigators, helps explain why Epstein bequeathed them substantial sums in his will — $50 million to Indyke and $25 million to Kahn. The bequests were second only to the $100 million left to Karyna Shuliak, Epstein’s fiancée at the time of his death.
But with the estate still entangled in lawsuits, settlements, and complex asset liquidations, both executors say they may never see that money.
An Estate Still in Limbo
Epstein’s assets — which once included a Caribbean island, a New Mexico ranch, multiple Manhattan properties, and a Paris apartment — have been gradually sold off. But the process of winding down the estate has been anything but straightforward.
According to the most recent quarterly accounting filed in US Virgin Islands probate court, the estate holds approximately $127 million in assets. That figure does not include roughly $172 million invested in two funds managed by Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures, which Indyke said remain illiquid.
“The estate is burning through between $5 million and $10 million in legal fees and other expenses each year,” Kahn testified on March 11.
Those expenses include a $35 million settlement reached earlier this month with a class of Epstein victims, with additional lawsuits from other accusers still pending.
Kahn estimated that fully settling the estate’s affairs could take a decade.
The 1953 Trust and Uncertain Payouts
Any remaining assets will eventually flow into an entity called The 1953 Trust — a “pour-over trust” established to receive the estate’s residue after all debts, claims, and expenses are resolved.
But the order of distributions places Shuliak first in line, followed by Indyke and Kahn. Given the mounting legal costs and ongoing claims, Kahn told Congress he has little expectation of receiving his inheritance.
“I believe that it’s likely that I will receive zero from Epstein’s 1953 Trust based on the value of its assets and its remaining obligations,” he said.
Kahn noted that the $25 million bequest roughly approximated what he would have been entitled to as an “executive fee” had the estate been administered in New York or Florida, plus an additional amount similar to what other long-term employees received.
Indyke, who earned a $2 million annual salary from Epstein at the time of his death, said he never discussed the rationale behind the bequests with the financier.
“Why he did what he did and why he gave money to whom he gave money to, we never had conversations like that with Epstein,” Indyke testified. “He always did what he did for his reasons, and he never discussed his reasons with me.”
Inside Epstein’s Lavish Spending
The depositions offered rare insight into Epstein’s extraordinary annual expenditures before his death. Kahn testified that Epstein spent between $25 million and $30 million annually on household operations, including payroll for staff, private jet fuel and maintenance, and upkeep of his five properties.
That level of spending, both executors said, meant that Epstein’s frequent cash withdrawals did not initially raise red flags.
JPMorgan Chase cut ties with Epstein in 2013, with bank employees citing suspicion over his repeated withdrawals of thousands of dollars in cash. Both Indyke and Kahn testified they were unaware at the time of Epstein’s history of paying teenage girls in cash for sexual encounters — a pattern that led to his 2008 guilty plea in Florida.
Kahn, who managed the “petty cash” used for the in-house accounting office’s expenses, said he believed all cash payments had legitimate purposes. After JPMorgan severed ties, Epstein struggled to obtain credit cards, Kahn said, and many vendors did not accept his American Express card.
By late 2018, following a Miami Herald investigation that renewed public scrutiny of Epstein’s sexual abuse history, Deutsche Bank also cut off his accounts. The resulting cash-flow problems became so severe, Kahn testified, that Epstein attempted to open his own bank.
The Unbuilt Bank
Epstein held a dormant banking license in the US Virgin Islands, Kahn said, and had begun moving assets into an entity called Southern Country International in preparation for launching a financial institution. Those plans collapsed following Epstein’s July 2019 arrest on federal sex trafficking charges.
Kahn’s deposition also identified Epstein’s financial clients — a small circle that included L Brands founder Les Wexner, Apollo Global Management co-founder Leon Black, banker Ariane de Rothschild, former Microsoft executive Steven Sinofsky, and Highbridge Capital Management, the hedge fund co-founded by Glenn Dubin.
A Role They Never Wanted
Both executors expressed ambivalence about their positions. Kahn told congressional investigators the role had caused “tremendous strife” for him and his family and inflicted irreparable damage to his reputation.
He accepted the position, he said, only because he believed he could handle the dissolution of Epstein’s household operations “in a respectful and kind fashion” and because his intimate knowledge of Epstein’s assets would help ensure victims received compensation.
“Other than compensating victims, I would never take on this role again, as co-executor,” Kahn said.
Indyke continues to practice law at the firm of Tim Parlatore, a former attorney for President Donald Trump. He told investigators he has maintained income through separate legal work and real estate investments.
The estate’s legal representation remains formidable, with Daniel Weiner of Hughes Hubbard & Reed representing Indyke and Daniel Ruzumna of Patterson Belknap representing Kahn.
What Comes Next
With a decade-long timeline still ahead, the Epstein estate’s winding path through probate court, victim compensation funds, and asset liquidation continues. Whether Indyke and Kahn will ever see the millions Epstein intended for them remains an open question — one that may not be answered for years.
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