St. Croix
Island of the U.S. Virgin Islands, site of the 1878 Fireburn, the 1972 Fountain Valley killings and the HOVENSA refinery that Epstein's circle discussed as a Guantanamo replacement.
St. Croix is one of the three major islands of the U.S. Virgin Islands, with St. Thomas and St. John, and includes the town of Christiansted. Under Danish rule it was the scene of the 1878 Fireburn uprising on its sugarcane plantations, and it later held the HOVENSA oil refinery, whose idled plant Cecile de Jongh told Jeffrey Epstein in 2015 that the Department of Defense would assess as a replacement for the prison at Guantanamo. Governor Albert Bryan finished school and worked on St. Croix, Governor Kenneth Mapp represented it in the Legislature, and a St. Croix environmental firm prepared the permitting for Epstein's post-hurricane docks on Great St. James.123456
The Fireburn
On St. Croix in 1878, under Danish rule, plantation workers rose against their working and living conditions in the Fireburn, a post-slavery uprising in which four women, led by Queen Mary, set fire to some fifty sugarcane plantations. In 2009 Wayne James, elected from St. Croix to the 28th Legislature of the Virgin Islands, obtained legislative funds to copy and translate Fireburn records in the Danish National Archives and, after the territory began garnishing his salary over a 197,000 dollar tax levy, submitted fake invoices, causing the Legislature to pay him more than 90,000 dollars, of which he kept about 70,000 dollars. He received more than 1,600 pages of documents and never delivered them. A federal jury convicted him of wire fraud and theft of federal program funds on August 16, 2018; the prosecutor said he had "exploited a precious piece of Virgin Islands history for his own purposes."5
Before the creation of the Virgin Islands Port Authority, the federal Virgin Islands Corporation, established in 1949, kept its principal offices on St. Croix, where it grew sugarcane, manufactured raw sugar, generated electricity and ran hotels, a beach club and a golf course. The Port Authority's St. Croix office is in the terminal of Henry E. Rohlsen Airport at Estate Manning Bay.6
Fountain Valley
On September 6, 1972 five gunmen entered the Fountain Valley Golf Course and killed eight people and wounded eight more. The alleged leader, Ishmael LaBeet, was a Vietnam veteran with a bad-conduct discharge. LaBeet, Warren Ballentine, Beaumont Gereau, Meral Smith and Raphael Joseph were each convicted and sentenced to eight consecutive life terms. Michael Joseph, a St. Croix attorney whose brother Raphael was among the five, wrote in his 2014 book Fountain Valley 1972 that LaBeet had shot at a police officer and hidden in the bush of the Grove Place area, that the five were tortured after their capture, and that the protracted manhunt damaged the island's economy as travel agents on the mainland dropped it from their recommended destinations. In 1984 LaBeet, then using the name Ismail Ali, hijacked a plane during a prison transfer and escaped to Cuba. Governor Alexander Farrelly pardoned Raphael Joseph in 1992. The course is now known as Carambola.7
The Refinery
The St. Croix refinery was operated by HOVENSA before it passed to new owners, and a 2011 federal consent decree resolved Clean Air Act violations by HOVENSA. Albert Bryan, who moved to St. Croix as a teenager and graduated from St. Dunstan's Episcopal High School in 1985, worked at the Hess oil operation there before entering government. In March 2015 Cecile de Jongh, the office manager of Epstein's companies and wife of former Governor John de Jongh, informed Epstein that Governor Mapp was interested in repurposing the refinery, writing that the Department of Defense was "sending a team to St. Croix within the month to make a full assessment of the HOVENSA facility for use as a replacement for the prison at Guantanamo, or other military use in light of the proposed closing of GTMO." On November 16, 2016, after the election of Donald Trump, Epstein asked Mapp whether he wanted to discuss "trump (sic) priorities? I think he would like your guantamo (sic) proposal." The University of the Virgin Islands board chairman Alex Moorhead, whom Cecile de Jongh described to Epstein in 2011 as "QUIET AND CONSERVATIVE," was a retired vice president for government affairs of HOVENSA.238
The plant reopened under new owners as Limetree Bay. After a flaring event on February 4, 2021 and further air emissions incidents, the Environmental Protection Agency ordered Limetree Bay on May 14, 2021 to pause all operations, citing "the imminent and substantial endangerment to public health or welfare" posed by continued operation. The refinery was sold at a bankruptcy auction on December 21, 2021 to West Indies Petroleum Limited and Port Hamilton Refining and Transportation.1
Epstein's Money on St. Croix
Kenneth Mapp served three terms as a senator from St. Croix before his election as governor in 2014. On October 16, 2014 Cecile de Jongh asked Epstein how much he would give to the St. Croix District Democratic Party, and he agreed to give 15,000 dollars. As governor, Mapp raised money from Epstein for the Queen Louise Home for Children on St. Croix, reporting a public presentation of donations totaling 140,500 dollars and later acknowledging a further 20,000 dollars. Epstein's 2009 suit against Bear Stearns on behalf of Financial Trust Company was filed by the St. Croix lawyer John K. Dema.9101112
In January 2018 Bioimpact, Inc., an environmental consulting firm in Kingshill, St. Croix, issued a revised report for Great St. Jim, LLC, Epstein's company owning Great St. James, on temporary barge landings and access docks "on the point closest to Little St. James," built after Hurricanes Irma and Maria to bring in emergency supplies and to house employees who had lost their homes. The report noted that the Army Corps of Engineers had spotted emergency rubble ramps in "aerial surveillance" and required their removal pending permits.4
Later Ties
Tova Noel, one of the two guards on duty at the Metropolitan Correctional Center the night Epstein died in August 2019, was born in Antigua and lived for several years on St. Croix. In February 2026 Senator Kenneth Gittens opposed the reconfirmation of three Port Authority board members, complaining of the lack of development on St. Croix compared with St. Thomas: "We talking one port, one VI." The 2020 census found that each of the territory's major islands, St. Croix among them, had lost population since 2010.131415
Sources
- U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, "Limetree Bay Terminals and Limetree Bay Refining, LLC, St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands (Formerly, HOVENSA)," page last updated March 22, 2022. https://www.epa.gov/vi/limetree-bay-terminals-and-limetree-bay-refining-llc ↩
- Carlson, Suzanne. "Files reveal Epstein's efforts to influence V.I. officials; emails with Mapp." Virgin Islands Daily News, February 2, 2026. https://www.virginislandsdailynews.com/news/files-reveal-epstein-s-efforts-to-influence-v-i-officials-emails-with-mapp/article_2dd4fe69-4daf-4dc2-b3b8-37a929002bb6.html ↩
- "Governor Albert Bryan Jr." Biography submitted to the U.S. House Committee on Natural Resources, hearing of March 24, 2021. https://docs.house.gov/meetings/II/II00/20210324/111384/HHRG-117-II00-Bio-BryanJrA-20210324.pdf ↩
- U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00802723, DataSet 9, Bioimpact, Inc., Kingshill, St. Croix, environmental report for Great St. Jim, LLC, revised January 2018. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00802723.pdf ↩
- U.S. Attorney's Office, District of the Virgin Islands, "Former Senator Wayne James Found Guilty on Wire Fraud and Embezzlement of Government Funds," August 16, 2018, captured May 25, 2026. https://web.archive.org/web/20260525040514/https://www.justice.gov/usao-vi/pr/former-senator-wayne-james-found-guilty-wire-fraud-and-embezzlement-government-funds ↩
- Virgin Islands Port Authority, "Our History," accessed September 25, 2026. https://www.viport.com/our-history ↩
- Probasco, Mat. "Analysis: 50 Years After Fountain Valley." St. Thomas Source, September 5, 2022, captured September 9, 2022. https://web.archive.org/web/20220909014410/https://stthomassource.com/content/2022/09/05/analysis-50-years-after-fountain-valley/ ↩
- U.S. Department of Justice, Epstein Library, EFTA00720076, DataSet 9, email from Cecile de Jongh to "JEE," October 19, 2011 (duplicate EFTA02035483, DataSet 10). https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet%209/EFTA00720076.pdf ↩
- National Governors Association, "Gov. Kenneth Mapp," former Virgin Islands governors. https://www.nga.org/governor/kenneth-mapp/ ↩
- Doe 1 v. Government of the United States Virgin Islands, No. 1:23-cv-10301-AS (S.D.N.Y.), Second Amended Complaint, ECF No. 112 (May 24, 2024), chart (Exhibit J), p. 5. https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.610915/gov.uscourts.nysd.610915.112.0.pdf ↩
- Gilbert, Ernice. "Former Gov. Kenneth Mapp Visited Epstein's Island, Sought $50,000 for Final Election Push, DOJ Records Show." The Virgin Islands Consortium, January 31, 2026. https://viconsortium.com/vi-federal/virgin-islands-former-gov--kenneth-mapp-visited-epstein-s-island--sought--50-000-for--final-push---doj-records-show ↩
- Financial Trust Company, Inc. v. The Bear Stearns Companies Inc., Civil No. 2009/106 (D.V.I.), Verified Complaint dated August 5, 2009; reproduced as Exhibit 253, ECF No. 244-8 (filed July 25, 2023), in Government of the United States Virgin Islands v. JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., No. 1:22-cv-10904-JSR (S.D.N.Y.). https://web.archive.org/web/20260117011822/https://www.justice.gov/multimedia/Court%20Records/Government%20of%20the%20United%20States%20Virgin%20Islands%20v.%20JPMorgan%20Chase%20Bank,%20N.A.,%20No.%20122-cv-10904%20(S.D.N.Y.%202022)/244-08.pdf ↩
- Brown, Julie K. "Tova Noel, the prison guard who worked night of Epstein's death, was born in Antigua and lived a number of years on STX." Miami Herald via Virgin Islands Daily News, March 27, 2026. https://www.virginislandsdailynews.com/ap/tova-noel-the-prison-guard-who-worked-night-of-epstein-s-death-was-born-in/article_e0fd90de-fa08-4667-9bff-838a8e591755.html ↩
- Charlemagne, Nelcia. "After Two-Term Limit, VIPA Board Nominees Advance on 'Exceptional Service' Vote." The Virgin Islands Consortium, February 27, 2026. https://viconsortium.com/vi-senate/virgin-islands-after-two-term-limit--vipa-board-nominees-advance-on--exceptional-service--vote ↩
- U.S. Census Bureau, "First 2020 Census United States Island Areas Data Released Today," October 2021. https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/10/first-2020-census-united-states-island-areas-data-released-today.html ↩
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