A United Methodist pastor in Missouri has been placed on leave for 90 days after her past working relationship with Jeffrey Epstein came to light. Bishop Robert Farr of the Missouri Conference made the decision last Thursday, days after the conference said it became aware of the connection.
Reverend Stephanie L. Remington served as Epstein's administrative assistant and property manager on Little Saint James, his private island, from August 2018 to May 2019. Her name appears in roughly 1,800 Epstein-related documents released by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Her defense? She compared herself to Jesus Christ.
Remington acknowledged she was aware of the convicted sex offender's past crimes when she took the job, The Daily Mail reports. Epstein had pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution in 2008 and was released from jail a year later. By the time Remington arrived on Little Saint James, his criminal history was not a secret. It was a matter of public record.
She described the relationship as "strictly professional," calling Epstein her boss. She claims she "never saw anything" during her time on the island.
The documents tell a story of someone embedded in Epstein's daily operations. A February 2019 email shows Epstein directing Remington about property maintenance:
"Self closing hindges [sic], kitchen doo[r]s. chillax bath toilet and door. all entry doors. thx."
Remington replied, "Will do."
About a month later, Epstein's last girlfriend, Karyna Shuliak, asked Remington to continue searching for rods and curtains she had personally ordered. Epstein and his longtime accountant Richard Kahn were copied on the exchange. Kahn followed up with his own questions to Remington:
"Is our crew doing this work?"
"Are we doing all sides of tunnel and not just roof?"
A March 2019 exchange showed Epstein coordinating Remington's travel plans to visit her ailing father. The misspelling of her name in his email captures the casual familiarity of the arrangement:
"Stephiaie [sic] will travel with us to palm tonight... her father is ill, lesley get her a flight from palm beach 748. to kansas city. and return monday from kansas city to stt."
Epstein's longtime pilot, Larry Visoski, was copied on the email and called Remington "Stephie." He added a personal note: "Sorry to hear about your father."
This was not a distant, transactional arrangement. Remington traveled with Epstein's entourage, corresponded with his inner circle by first name, and managed the physical infrastructure of an island that would become synonymous with the sexual trafficking of minors.
When confronted about the relationship, Remington reached for the highest possible authority:
"Jesus got into a lot of trouble for the company he kept, but he didn't let that trouble pressure him into rejecting the people who, by their standards, did not deserve to be human."
She continued:
"Social death is just another kind of murder. He opened his heart and his mind to them, and they opened their tables and alabaster jars to him. Is Jeffrey not among their kind?"
There is a meaningful difference between Jesus dining with tax collectors and a pastor managing property on a convicted sex offender's private island. Christ sat with sinners to call them to repentance. Remington managed door hinges and curtain rods for a man who had already pleaded guilty to procuring a child for prostitution. One is ministry. The other is employment.
Remington also offered broader reflections on the matter:
"The world is full of so much hate."
"There are many powerful men who have done despicable things with their privilege. They come and go in the news."
And then this:
"If association with sinners makes one guilty, then the church is in an awful state."
The question was never whether associating with sinners carries guilt. It was whether a pastor who claims to take sexual misconduct seriously chose to work for a man convicted of sexual crimes against children, on the very island where those crimes allegedly took place, and then obscured the fact for years.
This is where the story moves from uncomfortable to damning. Remington claimed in annual paperwork that she engaged in extension ministry through the Lewis Center for Church Leadership at Wesley Theological Seminary while she worked for Epstein, and as recently as last year. But an early review found she had not actually worked for the seminary during all of those years. She was only a part-time contractor in 2017 and 2018.
So while Remington was managing Epstein's island property, her official church records apparently reflected something else entirely.
Remington has claimed she filed a report last year and told her district superintendent via Zoom about her work with Epstein. Yet the Missouri Conference said it only became aware of the relationship last week, when the documents surfaced publicly. Those two timelines do not easily reconcile.
She also noted she had helped develop a church training curriculum on sexual boundaries earlier in her career. She said she "takes sexual misconduct seriously." She described Epstein as someone who was "very proud to have direct lines to all his presidents."
None of this answers the fundamental question: Why did a pastor who says she takes sexual misconduct seriously go to work for Jeffrey Epstein after his conviction, on his island, and then apparently misrepresent her professional activities to her church?
The Missouri Conference has said no new comments would be provided while a review process was underway. Remington left her job with Epstein in May 2019 to care for her father. Two months later, Epstein was arrested at Teterboro airport in New Jersey on July 6 and charged with trafficking and sexually abusing dozens of underage girls as young as 14. On August 10, 2019, he was found hanging in his New York prison cell while awaiting trial. His death was ruled a suicide.
Remington's nine months on Little Saint James fell in the final window before Epstein's world collapsed. She arrived after his conviction. She left before his arrest. And her church, by its own account, learned about it from news reports.
A 90-day suspension and a review process may be the procedural answer. Whether it is the moral one is a question the Missouri Conference will have to answer for its congregants. Remington framed herself as a Christ figure surrounded by judgment. The 1,800 documents frame her as something far more ordinary: someone who took the job, did the work, and hoped nobody would notice.
