Henry Smock

Henry Smock is a lawyer in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, and a former judge of the Territorial Court of the Virgin Islands. He assisted Jeffrey Epstein in the 1998 purchase of Little St. James and served for years as counsel to the board of the Virgin Islands Economic Development Authority, which oversees the Economic Development Commission program that granted Epstein's companies their tax exemptions; in November 2012 he swore in Epstein at the public hearing on Southern Trust Company's application. According to FBI notes of a 2023 interview with the former Attorney General Denise George, Governor Albert Bryan told her to settle the territory's suit against Epstein's estate and to "select Henry Smock" as mediator. Smock later represented Bryan in his divorce.¹²

Legal Career in the Territory

A biography of Smock, circulated in October 2011, states that he graduated from Rutgers University, came to the Virgin Islands in 1970, received his law degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and was admitted to the Virgin Islands bar in 1975, served as a judge of the Territorial Court from 1987 to 1993, was a partner of Smock & Moorehead, and was a former chairman of the territory's Law Revision Commission and a former president of the Virgin Islands Bar Association. He served on the board of trustees of the University of the Virgin Islands.³

The Governor's Wife's List

On October 19, 2011 Cecile de Jongh, wife of Governor John de Jongh and listed as office manager of Epstein's Virgin Islands companies,⁴ sent Epstein ("JEE") an email headed "RT Park Directors," profiling candidates for the board of the University of the Virgin Islands Research and Technology Park. She closed several entries with her own notes. Of the university's president, David Hall, she wrote, "DO NOT KNOW HIM THAT WELL AND HE IS NEW TO THE VI"; of the university board chairman, Alex Moorhead, a retired vice president for government affairs of the HOVENSA refinery, "I HAVE KNOWN HIM FOR YEARS - QUIET AND CONSERVATIVE"; and of the park's executive director, "DO NOT KNOW HIM THAT WELL." Three entries, including Smock's, ended with the word "FRIEND." The email closed: "John has two other appointments to make."³

Counsel to the Commission

The Economic Development Commission held a public hearing on Southern Trust Company's application on November 15, 2012, in the Port Authority conference room on St. Thomas, with Albert Bryan, then its chairman, presiding. The staff present were listed as including "HENRY SMOCK, ESQ., Legal Counsel." At the chair's request, the transcript records, "Erika Kellerhals, Esq. and Jeffrey Epstein were duly sworn in by Attorney Smock." Erika Kellerhals presented Epstein as "the President of Southern Trust," a company that would provide "consulting services to companies around the world" using "biomedical and financial informatics," and asked for a waiver of the employment requirement to five employees for five years. Epstein told the commission that "Places, frankly, like St. [Thomas] are the perfect place to sequence people because it's so isolated."²

When commissioner Millin Maduro asked legal counsel how the governor's veto of pending legislation on minimum employment would affect the application, Smock answered, "So we'll be dealing with the old legislation." Bryan said, "But the law allows for us to waive the employment in any case," and Smock replied, "If we wish." When Maduro proposed noting the waiver on the record so the applicant would not need to return for a modification hearing, Smock said, "I believe it's already a part of the application."² Southern Trust received a ten-year package of exemptions from February 2013.⁴

After Epstein's arrest in July 2019, Smock was part of the authority's nine-step protocol for answering press inquiries about Epstein's tax benefits.¹ In the Virgin Islands' suit against JPMorgan Chase, the bank's supplemental initial disclosures of August and September 2023 listed Smock as a person with knowledge of "Economic development tax incentives received or requested by Jeffrey Epstein."⁵

The Mediator Proposal

The territory's suit against Epstein's estate was filed by Attorney General George in 2020. In an interview with the FBI on October 2, 2023, released by the Justice Department on January 30, 2026, George said that Bryan's "original tone of 'Go for it' changed to 'End it quickly,'" and that he told her to settle with the estate for 80 million dollars "and to pursue mediation and select Henry Smock" as mediator, saying "that the Epstein estate just wanted to clear people." She said Bryan sent Carlton Dowe, director of the Virgin Islands Port Authority, to press her, and that Dowe told her it "would be political suicide to fire her at least before the election."¹ The estate settled on November 30, 2022 for more than 105 million dollars, with a share of the proceeds of any sale of Little St. James.⁶ Bryan removed George at the end of December 2022, days after she filed the territory's suit against JPMorgan. Bryan has said Epstein received no special privilege from his administration.¹⁷

The Divorce

Bryan filed for divorce in 2023 after 27 years of marriage. Smock represented him and obtained an order sealing the case records.¹ Smock has not been accused of any wrongdoing, and no public statement by him on these matters has been found.