Melinda Gates was furious about Bill Gates and Jeffrey Epstein's friendship as sex offender made her uncomfortable
Bill Gates and his wife Melinda Gates sent shockwaves through the planet when they announced they were divorcing after three decades and three children together. In the wake of their announcement, it's been revealed that the divorce and division of assets was planned a long time ago, before the world was informed about the split. While many are speculating what could have been the last straw for the couple, The Daily Beast has now reported that Melinda was not at all keen on maintaining any form of relationship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, right from the moment she encountered him for the first time with her husband Bill.
According to people familiar with the situation, the Gates met Epstein in his Upper East Side Mansion in New York City back in 2013. The day they met with Epstein was the same day the couple accepted the Lasker Bloomberg Public Service Award at Pierre Hotel. But sources close to the couple claim Melinda was furious at the budding relationship between her husband and the now-dead ex-financier. The meeting then ended up being a turning point for the Gates-Epstein relationship as Melinda reportedly told friends how uncomfortable she felt in Epstein's company and how she wanted nothing to do with him.
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Friends of the couple told the outlet how Bills' alleged friendship with Epstein still haunts Melinda. The disgraced financier was accused of sexually abusing numerous underage girls and died in his prison cell by alleged suicide in August 2019, while he was awaiting sentencing for these crimes. Bill was among the many prominent people in power who faced scrutiny after Epstein was arrested in 2019. The New York Times had revealed at the time that starting 2011, which was already three years after Epstein had pleaded guilty to soliciting a minor, Bill met with him on numerous occasions, including a gettogether at the sex offender's Manhattan townhouse.
The NYT reported at the time that the two people close to both Bill and Epstein who acted as intermediaries between the both were Boris Nikolic and Melanie Walker. Nikolic, a biotech investor and former advisor to Bill, was mysteriously named a backup executor in Epstein's last will and testament. As for Walker, she worked at the Gates Foundation and as a science advisor to Epstein.
Bill's visits to Epstein continued well up to 2013, between which The NYT had alleged that Epstein had tried pitching a new charitable fund to the Gates Foundation, and Bill also allegedly took a ride on Epstein's infamous private jet — the Lolita Express — in 2013. CNBC had also reported about Bill's 2013 New York rendezvous with Epstein. However, amid media's close scrutiny of his ties with Epstein, Bill claimed in September 2019, “I met him. I didn’t have any business relationship or friendship with him."
"I didn’t go to New Mexico or Florida or Palm Beach or any of that. There were people around him who were saying, ‘Hey, if you want to raise money for global health and get more philanthropy, he knows a lot of rich people.’ Every meeting where I was with him were meetings with men. I was never at any parties or anything like that. He never donated any money to anything that I know about.”
One source told The Daily Beast, "I can’t make the claim that so many are claiming. If you ask Bill Gates, he’ll say, ‘Oh I had absolutely no idea he wasn’t up to anything of the highest moral character.’ But I seriously doubted Epstein’s moral character. The people around him had a varying spectrum of what they knew and what they didn’t know and how they rationalized it.”
About Melinda being put off by Epstein, the same source told the outlet “a lot of people were uncomfortable with Epstein, completely independent of his” sexual misconduct. They added: “He just was an obnoxious guy. He almost made a point of having bad manners, not paying attention at dinner… I could see how anybody, even without suspicions, would not want to be around him.”
Epstein too was in the habit of bragging about how he was apparently an unofficial adviser, and at other times a tax consultant to Bill, although the Microsoft founder’s representatives have always denied those claims. After meeting Epstein for the first time, Bill had apparently written to his Microsoft staff in a mail: “His lifestyle is very different and kind of intriguing although it would not work for me.” A spokesperson for him clarified Bill “was referring only to the unique decor” at Epstein's Manhattan mansion and “Epstein’s habit of spontaneously bringing acquaintances in to meet Mr Gates”.
However, reports of the two's alleged friendship fizzled by 2014 after Bill donated $2M to MIT's Media Lab. Although Epstein had allegedly facilitated that donation, The NYT investigation noted: “Mr Epstein complained to an acquaintance at the end of 2014 that Mr Gates had stopped talking to him, according to a person familiar with the discussion.”