The jail guard who snoozed and shopped for furniture online while she was supposed to be checking on Jeffrey Epstein on the night he killed himself claims she’s the real victim — and Epstein’s latest.

“It is our hope to persuade the Government officials not to create another victim of Jeffrey Epstein’s apparent act of suicide,” bumbling guard Tova Noel’s lawyer Jason Foy said in a statement Wednesday, criticizing federal prosecutors for going after his client.

“The Government’s decision to criminalize work performance, when there is an administrative process available through the collective bargaining agreement negotiated by her union with the Federal Bureau of Prisons, is disappointing,” Foy said, adding his client had been fulling cooperating with the feds since Epstein’s death at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in August.

Noel and fellow MCC staffer Michael Thomas are accused of failing to check on the wealthy financier and other inmates overnight Aug. 9-10 — despite an earlier suicide attempt by Epstein — instead surfing the internet, dozing at their desks, and then filing false records claiming they’d performed the checks.

The duo discovered Epstein dead in his cell the next morning around 6:30a.m., per court records. His death was ruled a suicide by hanging, though a forensic pathologist hired by Epstein’s family announced he found the results were more consistent with homicidal strangulation.

Foy’s two-page statement said his client was a Gulf War veteran, and noted that her time as a corrections officer at the MCC had been served under “notoriously difficult conditions.”

Jose Rojas, a prison workers’ union official, told The Post it was “ridiculous” that the two had been hit with federal charges, since falsifying counts is considered a violation under the federal Bureau of Prison’s Standards of Employee conduct.

“The climate within the agency is toxic, and then on top of that, you have the situation with Epstein,” said Rojas. “The wardens make the call, then you have the [Solitary Housing Unit] lieutenant, and the captain, so to place the blame solely on the officers is exactly what we call scapegoating. It’s hypocritical, and it’s disgraceful.”

“You know the old saying, ‘s–t rolls downhill?’ They’re gonna blame the lowest people on the totem pole, and this is exactly what happened,” Rojas said.

Former MCC Warden Catherine Linaweaver said she’d seen plenty of BOP staffers falsifying records, but noted the matter had always been dealt with internally.

“I’m not saying it’s unprecedented in the history of the system, but it’s extremely rare,” said Linaweaver.

Former MDC warden Cameron Lindsay agreed, saying the offense wasn’t uncommon — but the reaction was.

“I have never, in 30 years of working in the field of corrections, seen an instance where correctional officers were indicted for falsifying records relate to rounds,” Linsday said. “I’ve seen it happen many many times before in my career, I cannot recall an instance of that.”

Noel and Thomas were released on $100,000 bond, and are due back in court Monday.