[Jeffrey] Epstein, a multimillionaire hedge fund manager whose friends included a constellation of entertainers, politicians, business titans and royalty, for years lured teenage girls to his Palm Beach mansion as part of a cult-like sex pyramid scheme, police in the town of Palm Beach found. In 2007, despite ample [evidence], federal prosecutors and Epstein's lawyers quietly put together a remarkable deal for Epstein. He and his accomplices received immunity from federal sex-trafficking charges. After the FBI case was closed in 2008, witnesses and alleged victims testified in civil court that there were hundreds of girls who were brought to Epstein's homes, including girls from Europe, Latin America and former Soviet Republic countries. There were really just two people willing to risk their careers to go after Epstein: Palm Beach Police Chief Michael Reiter and Detective Joseph Recarey. In their first media interviews about the case, Reiter and Recarey revealed [how they were] pressured by then-Palm Beach State Attorney Barry Krischer to downgrade the case to a misdemeanor or drop it altogether. Police reports show that Epstein's private investigators attempted to conduct interviews while posing as cops; that they picked through Reiter's trash in search of dirt to discredit him; and that the private investigators were accused of following the girls and their families. "It became apparent to me that some of our evidence was being leaked to Epstein's lawyers," Reiter said.