Trump World Has A Man With Convictions

NOVEMBER 20--Who better to help lead Donald Trump’s effort to fill top positions in the Department of Justice and White House counsel’s office than “an ugly version of Tony Soprano,” a lawyer who has separately been criminally convicted of assaulting a man in an Arizona bar and drunkenly groping a young woman at another Scottsdale nightspot.

Additionally, the Trump adviser is currently under indictment in Arizona for his alleged role in an election subversion scheme in the wake of the 2020 presidential election.

With a yellow sheet like that, hulking Boris Epshteyn is a Trump World star, a 43-year-old lawyer/consigliere who pushed for Matt Gaetz as attorney general and is helping to shape Trump’s choice of other cabinet and White House positions.

As previously reported in these pages, the 6’4”, 275-pound Epshteyn was arrested in January 2014 for sucker punching a man in the face during a 2:25 AM confrontation at Scottsdale’s Whiskey Row nightclub. The victim was left bloodied and Epshteyn ended up in handcuffs.

Pictured in the above mug shots, Epshteyn was described by police as a “large white male in a pink shirt” who was “significantly larger” than his victim.

Epshteyn subsequently pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and was ordered to attend anger management classes, perform 25 hours of community service, and pay fines and court costs. He was also barred from returning to the Old Town Scottsdale bar.

Epshteyn was next in police custody in October 2021 following a Saturday night incident at Bottled Blonde, a nightclub a few blocks from Whiskey Row.

Police were called to the club after two sisters--ages 27 and 23--complained to security that they had been inappropriately touched by a male patron who, the older victim said, resembled an “ugly version of Tony Soprano.”

“All night he’s been like touching me and my sister, especially my sister. He kind of cornered her and grabbed her...just making her super uncomfortable,” the older woman said, according to police bodycam footage. “Touching her after we repeatedly told him to stop touching her.”

According to a police report, the older sister said the suspect was “grabbing their waist and pulling them into his crotch,” and that he touched them “other places on their bodies, over their clothing but did not touch their genitals.” She alleged that the man seemed to favor her sister, “and touched her more than any other female in an aggressive manner to include pulling her into him when she attempted to pull away and groping her breasts outside of her clothes.”

The older sister told cops they had been invited to a table and offered free drinks, but when they subsequently told the suspect to stop groping them--and that they “did not appreciate his behavior”--he replied “that if they did not like it that they should leave the table,” according to a police report.

When police spoke with the younger woman, a registered nurse, outside the club, she was crying with mascara running down her face. She told cops she had called an Uber and that she “just wanted to go home.”

Officers confronted Epshteyn outside the club around 1:30 AM and identified him as the groping suspect. He was wearing a white Polo shirt, blue shorts, sandals, and a wedding ring when he was handcuffed and stuffed into a Scottsdale Police Department van after being read his rights.

Epshteyn was charged with disorderly conduct, attempted sexual abuse, assault touching, and harassment. Epshteyn, who was born in Russia, is listed as a Princeton, New Jersey resident in court files.

In a plea deal, Epshteyn copped to disorderly conduct, with prosecutors agreeing to dismiss the other charges. A Municipal Court judge ordered Epshteyn to serve five days in jail, but the execution of that sentence was to be suspended upon completion of an 11-month probation term. Epshteyn was also directed to enroll in an alcohol treatment program, fined $710, and ordered to have no contact with the sisters upon whom he creeped.

A review of the court file shows that Epshteyn filed a post-conviction petition to seal all court records “pertaining to the dismissed counts only.”

Epshteyn’s lawyer, Randall Craig, wrote that the criminal case against his client “arises out of the defendant having a little too much to drink at a local bar and getting too friendly with a female patron of the bar.” Craig claimed that the older victim told police that Epshteyn “merely got a little too handsy by placing his hands on her waist.”

Craig also wrote that the woman “said [Epshteyn] never touched her genitals in any way.” Grabbing ‘em by the pussy, of course, is someone else’s patented move.

In arguing to seal the records, Craig described Epshteyn as a “public figure in the Washington DC area and is concerned that the information on the court website may harm his career.” Additionally, “The defendant is also embarrassed by the dismissed charges and the effect they may have on his reputation.”

Epshteyn’s motion to memory hole the records--which was filed a full 18 months before the criminal case was eventually discovered by the Arizona Republic--was denied by Judge James Blake.

Despite Epshteyn’s fear that his career and reputation would be damaged, he appears to have rebounded quite nicely from “merely” getting “a little too handsy” in a bar. The president-elect apparently is familiar with worse behavior directed at women. (7 pages)