• What Happened: New Mexico law enforcement descended on Jeffrey Epstein's former Zorro Ranch Monday, searching for the remains of two foreign girls allegedly strangled to death and buried on the property on orders of Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.
  • Why It Matters: The tip came from an anonymous email sent to a local radio host in 2019, the same year Epstein died. It was forwarded to the FBI. The FBI never followed up. New Mexico is now doing what the feds refused to do.
  • Bottom Line: A $2.5 million bipartisan truth commission with subpoena power just launched. The ranch is being dug up. And the question everyone is asking is why it took six years to look.

For six years, a tip sat in an FBI inbox. Two girls allegedly strangled to death. Bodies buried in the hills outside Jeffrey Epstein's remote New Mexico ranch on orders of Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. Nobody came to look.

That changed Monday, when agents from the New Mexico Department of Justice, along with local police and the county sheriff's office, descended on the 7,500-acre Zorro Ranch outside Stanley, New Mexico, 30 miles south of Santa Fe. The search continued into Tuesday.

The tip that triggered the operation came from an anonymous encrypted email sent in November 2019 to Eddy Aragon, a conservative talk radio host and former Albuquerque mayoral candidate, just months after Epstein's death in a Manhattan jail cell. The sender claimed to be a former ranch employee. "Did you know somewhere in the hills outside the Zorro, two foreign girls were buried on orders of Jeffrey and Madam G?" the email read. "Both died by strangulation during rough, fetish sex."

Aragon told reporters he forwarded the email to the FBI immediately after receiving it and was told investigators would follow up. He never heard another word.

The email resurfaced this year as part of the Justice Department's release of previously sealed Epstein files. New Mexico lawmakers responded in February by unanimously approving a bipartisan truth commission, armed with $2.5 million and subpoena power, to investigate what happened at Zorro Ranch. The commission launches in April.

State Rep. Andrea Romero, who is leading the commission, told the Daily Mail the tips keep coming. "We have people coming forward saying they were drugged, had sex organs and sperm harvested from their bodies, and woke up around medical equipment not knowing where they were or what happened to them," she said. Since the commission was announced, Romero said lawmakers have received 25 to 30 first-hand accounts of abuse at the ranch.

The New Mexico DOJ confirmed the Huffines family, which purchased the ranch in 2023 and plans to convert it into a Christian retreat, granted full access to investigators. New Mexico AG spokesman Lauren Rodriguez asked the public to stay clear of the area and ground any drone activity nearby.

"We have heard years of allegations and rumors about Epstein's activities in New Mexico, but unfortunately, federal investigations have failed to put together an official record," Romero said. "With this truth commission, we can finally fill in the gaps."

The ranch sits on 13 square miles of high desert and includes a luxury hacienda, guest lodges, staff quarters, horse stables, a private airstrip, a hangar, and a helipad. Epstein owned it from 1993 until his death. Multiple survivors have testified they were trafficked and abused there as teenagers. It has received far less scrutiny than Epstein's private island or his Manhattan townhouse.

Law enforcement says it is confident it can find the bodies if they exist. For the two girls whose names nobody knows, it is the first time anyone has looked.