After a mutual acquaintance pointed me in Bryant’s direction, I gave him a call to talk about Epstein, the black book, and where he thinks all of this might be headed.

Vanity Fair: You started digging into Jeffrey Epstein after writing The Franklin Scandal. What are some of the similarities you found?

Nick Bryant: That book is a template for what’s happening now and how high up it goes. A major parallel between the two stories is that Lawrence King, who was one of the primary pimps of this pedophile network I wrote about, and Jeffrey Epstein, they were both flying children interstate, and they had both done it with impunity for a number of years. In both instances you have officials who were unwilling to back down. In Epstein, you had the Palm Beach Police Department that was unwilling to back down, and in Lawrence King, you had the Nebraska Senate that was unwilling to back down. Epstein had an island, and I’m sure he had these parties also at his place in Manhattan and elsewhere, and there were hidden cameras. In this particular venue in Washington, DC, where the Nebraska victims were trafficked, there were also hidden cameras. The individual who owned the house in Washington, DC, he had intelligence affiliations. We’re seeing with Epstein that he also had alleged intelligence connections. King and Epstein collected children in the same type of fashion. King would have kids conscript other kids, just like Epstein would have kids conscript other kids. In both cases the victims were threatened and hassled. Both Jeffrey Epstein and Lawrence King had lavish lifestyles, but there wasn’t an obvious explanation for their wealth, and both were prominently associated with power brokers of the highest order. [Editor’s note: A grand jury concluded there was no evidence to charge King with any sex crimes.]

When did you first start digging around on Epstein?

Probably eight years ago.

You had a hard time getting The Franklin Scandal published because of the subject matter, and Epstein was probably looking like a similar uphill battle. Why pursue it?

A guy like Epstein doesn’t stop. That’s the thing. That’s why I wanted to bring this to light.

What did your early reporting consist of?

I was talking to lawyers. And the Palm Beach police chief. Because of the settlements, I knew there was something there.

And then you managed to get your hands on his black book. How did that materialize?

The FBI had confiscated the black book form Epstein’s house manager, and I was fortunate enough to acquire it after the FBI had.

When was that?

It was around 2012.

That was before the Daily Mail first reported on the black book in 2015. Was its existence publicly known at that point?

I believe it might have been used as discovery in one of the civil lawsuits.

What was your first impression when you read through it and saw all the names?

I’d seen this exact same thing before with The Franklin Scandal. It was like déjà vu. I felt like, well, here’s another power broker pedophile network. Definitely.

What stood out to you the most?

His lofty social connections were pretty mind-boggling. There were approximately 22 contact numbers for Bill Clinton. And the names of the people the house manager had circled were pretty stunning.

Did you just start calling everyone?

I started calling victims. And they were very, very hard to talk to at that point.

How many did you call?

I called as many as I could call. A lot of the numbers were disconnected, but I was able to talk to some of them, and they essentially corroborated what I thought, that Epstein was the pimp of a very large network.