David Schoen

David Schoen is an American attorney whose practice has focused on federal criminal defense and civil-rights litigation. His work has spanned civil-rights cases challenging police and prison conduct, voting-rights and ballot-access matters, and other civil litigation, and his clients have included Roger Stone and Steve Bannon. He gained wider public attention representing former President Donald Trump during Trump’s second impeachment trial in 2021. He also “briefly” represented Jeffrey Epstein before Epstein’s death.

In interviews cited by Newsweek, Schoen has described how he came to be involved with Epstein. He has said he first met Epstein around 2008, during Epstein’s earlier case, and that he was in contact with Epstein again in the summer of 2019 while Epstein was held at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan on new federal charges. Schoen told Newsweek: “I met with Mr. Epstein on August 1st at his request. We met for 5 hours,” and said that during that period Epstein asked him to take over his defense. According to Schoen, “The purpose of asking me to come there that day and over the past previous couple of weeks was to ask me to take over his defence. We came to an agreement during the course of that discussion.”

Schoen has also publicly questioned the official determination that Epstein died by suicide. He has said Epstein appeared “animated and energized” after their meeting and eager to fight the case, and stated, “I don’t think it was a suicide.” Schoen has said he had arranged to meet Epstein again around the time of Epstein’s death but postponed the meeting. Epstein died at the Manhattan jail in August 2019 in what was officially ruled a suicide.

Is David Schoen in the Epstein files?

David Schoen is publicly documented as one of the attorneys connected to Jeffrey Epstein. By his own account, reported by Newsweek, he met with Epstein at a federal jail in August 2019, shortly before Epstein’s death, and Epstein asked him to take over his criminal defense. Being named or appearing in connection with the Epstein matter is not evidence of any crime or wrongdoing; people appear in these documents and reporting in many contexts, including as attorneys, correspondents, or associates. The sources below reflect the specific, documented context for Schoen, including his own public statements.

Documents

Primary-source records that name or reference David Schoen. Inclusion in these documents is not, by itself, evidence of wrongdoing; Schoen has not been charged with any crime, and he says he was never formally retained as Epstein’s counsel.

• House Oversight Committee — Epstein email correspondence (Nov. 2025) — Schoen appears in email correspondence with Jeffrey Epstein among the records released by the House Oversight Committee. As reported by The New Arab (Feb. 2026), the released emails show the two communicating frequently from February 2019 until Epstein’s death in August 2019 — including a February 28, 2019 message from Schoen — with Epstein discussing Schoen as early as 2010. Schoen’s name does not appear in the Jan. 2024 Giuffre v. Maxwell unsealing.