<\/p>\n
A PowerPoint published among the Department of Justice files on Jeffrey Epstein<\/p>\n
Department of Justice<\/p>\n
Roughly seven years after Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to two prostitution charges in Palm Beach County in 2008, he secretly invested $1 million in an Israeli security technology startup that had signed deals with multiple law-enforcement agencies in Florida, including the Miami-Dade Police Department.<\/p>\n
The Florida Highway Patrol, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission<\/a> and North Miami Beach Police also inked contracts with Carbyne, which developed an app that allows 911 callers to share videos with 911 dispatchers, enabling first responders to get a preliminary assessment of the scene.<\/p>\n READ MORE: Prison guards discussed cover-up of Epstein\u2019s death, inmate tells FBI<\/a><\/p>\n Miami-Dade County spent nearly $2 million on a three-year contract<\/a> with Carbyne in September 2021 for the Miami-Dade Police Department, now Sheriff\u2019s Office, to test the system.<\/p>\n The agency told the Miami Herald it didn\u2019t have any active contracts with Carbyne. The county mayor\u2019s office told the Herald that the contract had been awarded through the standard procurement process, which does not include a review of a company\u2019s investors.<\/p>\n North Miami Beach\u2019s police department uses an application<\/a> similar to the one contracted by the Miami-Dade Sheriff\u2019s Office, the company said in a March 2024 release announcing the deal.<\/p>\n Commander Nichole Camacho of the city\u2019s police department called Carbyne\u2019s system a \u201cgame changer\u201d that would ensure officers had the \u201cright information to respond quickly,\u201d the release said.<\/p>\n The agency told the Herald that its contract was worth around $600,000 and was in place until 2029.<\/p>\n Florida Highway Patrol undertook a project, dubbed the \u201cDesk Trooper\u201d program, in late 2024 in which state troopers used Carbyne\u2019s technology to remotely respond to minor road accidents on the Central Florida Expressway in greater Orlando.<\/p>\n The expressway authority \u2014 a state agency \u2014 paid roughly $900,000 as per the contract, which will expire in October, according to a copy of the contract the Herald obtained through a public records request.<\/p>\n The Fish and Wildlife Commission declined to answer the Herald\u2019s questions about its contract with Carbyne.<\/p>\n The Herald\u2019s findings about Epstein\u2019s involvement in Carbyne is based on the millions of pages of Epstein records recently released by the U.S. Justice Department.<\/p>\n READ MORE: Perversion of Justice: Investigating Epstein<\/a><\/p>\n The Arizona-based security tech giant, Axon, acquired Carbyne for $625 million<\/a> last year. Axon is best known for making police body cameras and Tasers. It is unclear whether Axon knew that Epstein had been an early investor.<\/p>\n Axon\u2019s filings to the Securities and Exchange Commission and earnings calls from the time around the acquisition do not mention the disgraced financier. Axon did not respond to the Herald\u2019s multiple requests for comment.<\/p>\n Connections with ex-Israeli prime minister<\/p>\n Epstein\u2019s investment in Carbyne was brokered by former Israel prime minister Ehud Barak, with whom he shared a years-long relationship.<\/p>\n Carbyne, initially named Reporty Homeland Security, was founded by a group of Israelis with backgrounds in the country\u2019s military and intelligence services. The privately held company launched in the spring of 2015 in Israel. Today it is headquartered in New York with offices in Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n Barak was an early investor in Carbyne and board chairman but the released records show that at least $1 million of his funds came from Epstein\u2019s<\/a> Southern Trust Company<\/a>. Epstein first started conversations with Barak about a possible investment in December 2014, according to the records, roughly five months before the startup\u2019s launch.<\/p>\n \u201cI assume that by Monday evening we will be ripe for decision on th= investment. Most probably a positive one,\u201d wrote Barak in a Dec. 18, 2014, email<\/a> to Epstein. \u201cPI [sic.] make the proper preparations.\u201d<\/p>\n Epstein sent<\/a> the funds to one of Barak\u2019s holding companies in March 2015.<\/p>\n Nicole Junkermann invested<\/a> another $500,000, the released records show. Junkermann, a German countess and entrepreneur, had a decades-long relationship with Epstein and according to the released documents, shared sexually explicit messages with him.<\/p>\n The company was valued at $4.5 million at the time of the investments by Epstein and Junkermann, the records show. The released records also include some of the company\u2019s financials. None list Epstein as an investor.<\/p>\n Keep the investment quiet<\/p>\n An email about the investment from Darren Indyke, Epstein\u2019s personal attorney, indicates that Epstein did not want his involvement made public.<\/p>\n \u201cI thought we did not want your name associated with this investment,\u201d wrote<\/a> Indyke in March 14, 2019, missive to the financier about whether they should reveal his identity to Carbyne.<\/p>\n Barak disputed the characterization of Epstein\u2019s investment as \u201csecret\u201d through a statement by his attorney Bruce Goodman.<\/p>\n The attorney said in a March 11 email to the Herald that Epstein\u2019s Southern Trust was one among several limited partners, had no role in Carbyne\u2019s \u201cmanagement or decision making\u201d and exercised its right to remain confidential.<\/p>\n \u201cAll of Mr. Barak\u2019s business activities, including those related to Reporty\/Carbyne, were conducted with the advice of legal counsel, in compliance with all laws and regulations,\u201d Goodman wrote in the email.<\/p>\n Epstein\u2019s correspondences show he received regular updates about the company until March 2019 \u2014 just months before federal agents in New York arrested him on July 6, 2019, on two counts of sex-trafficking of minors. He was found dead in his cell at the federal detention center in Manhattan on Aug. 10, 2019, a month later. The medical examiner ruled that his death was a suicide by hanging.<\/p>\n Barak stepped down from Carbyne\u2019s board in April 2020. The company did not specify a reason.<\/p>\n Carbyne did not respond to the Herald\u2019s queries about whether senior company officials knew that Epstein had been an investor.<\/p>\n![\"Former](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/EPSCARB.JPG\" "\\"EPSCARB.JPG\\"")
Former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak gestures as he talks with foreign journalists in Jerusalem on April 4, 2016. THOMAS COEX AFP via Getty Images <\/p>\n
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