TWO U.S. jail guards responsible for monitoring financier Jeffrey Epstein the night he killed himself were charged Tuesday with falsifying prison records in order to conceal that they were sleeping and browsing the Internet during the hours they were supposed to be keeping a close watch on prisoners.

Details of the indictment reinforce the idea that for all the intrigue regarding Epstein and his connections to powerful people, his death was a suicide, and possibly preventable if the people guarding him had been doing their jobs.

Guards Tova Noel and Michael Thomas were accused in a grand jury indictment of neglecting their duties by failing to check on Epstein for nearly eight hours, and of fabricating log entries to show they had been making checks every 30 minutes, as required.

The charges against the officers in connection with the wealthy financier’s death in August provide a damning glimpse of security lapses inside a high-security unit at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York, where Epstein had been awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.

Instead of making required rounds, the guards sat at their desks just 5 meters from Epstein’s cell, shopped online for furniture and motorcycles, and walked around the unit’s common area, the indictment said. During one two-hour period, it said, both appeared to have been asleep.

Prosecutors said security camera footage confirmed that no one entered the area where Epstein was housed on the night he died — evidence that might also dampen conspiracy theories by people who have questioned whether he really took his own life.

A lawyer for Thomas, Montell Figgins, said both guards are being “scapegoated.”

Both correctional officers pleaded not guilty Tuesday afternoon and were released on US$100,000 bond. The defendants, hiding their faces with clothing, left the courthouse in separate cars waiting for them in the shadow of the jail where they had worked and Epstein died.

Epstein’s death was a major embarrassment for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons.

The cell where he died was in a high-security unit, famous for having held terrorists and drug cartel kingpins. Epstein’s death, though, revealed the jail was suffering from problems including chronic staffing shortages that led to mandatory overtime for guards day after day and other staff being pressed into service as correctional officers.

Attorney General William Barr had previously said investigators found “serious irregularities” at the jail. (SD-Agencies)