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In August 2019, Jeffrey Epstein, the billionaire money manager who stood accused of sexually abusing dozens of underage girls, died in a Manhattan federal jail while awaiting trial. Epstein's death, reported as a suicide, drove a whole new wave of conspiracy theories about the man who allegedly recruited numerous young girls for sexual abuse at his homes in New York and Palm Beach. Many of those conspiracy theories focused on Little St. James, a 72-acre private island Epstein owned in the U.S. Virgin Islands that had supposedly been dubbed Pedophile Island and Orgy Island by locals. In particular, one theory spread via social media held that bones of children have been found on Epstein's island and questioned why isn't this headlines on every major network?: As is usually the case, the answer to the question of why this seemingly momentous piece of information hasn't been reported by reputable news organizations is because it isn't true. This rumor appears to have originated with an article published a few days after Epstein's death by WhatDoesItMean.com, a notorious purveyor of conspiracy-based junk news: As RationalWiki notes, WhatDoesItMean.com articles are attributed to Sorcha Faal, whose shtick is presenting shocking and secret information unreported by any legitimate news outlets, which Sorcha Faal has supposedly obtained from Russian government and intelligence sources: The FBI had reportedly raided Epstein's estate on Little St. James just before the salacious WhatDoesItMean.com article was published, but agents did not disclose finding any human bones (adult or otherwise) on or around the island: The false WhatDoesItMean.com report about the discovery of children's bones around Epstein's private island was then amplified by the usual methods, through social media posts and videos that repeated its false claims without informing viewers about the source and unreliability of those claims:
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