Some faculty districts within the U.S. dropped plans for sophistication photos after widespread social media posts linked a billionaire with ties to Jeffrey Epstein to the pictures large Lifetouch, which on Friday known as the claims “completely false.”
The disruption to highschool image plans in Texas and elsewhere started after on-line posts linked Lifetouch, which pictures thousands and thousands of scholars every year, to the funding fund supervisor Apollo International Administration. Apollo’s former CEO is billionaire investor Leon Black, who met usually with Epstein and was suggested by Epstein on monetary issues.
Black led the corporate in 2019, when funds managed by Apollo purchased Lifetouch’s father or mother firm, Shutterfly. The $2.7 billion deal closed in September 2019 — a month after Epstein’s demise by suicide behind bars as he awaited trial over allegations from federal prosecutors that he sexually abused and trafficked dozens of women.
Each Lifetouch and Apollo famous that timeline in statements Friday, two days after Lifetouch CEO Ken Murphy stated in an Instagram publish that neither Black nor any of Apollo’s administrators or traders ever had any entry to Lifetouch images.
“No Lifetouch executives have ever had any relationship or contact with Epstein and we have never shared student images with any third party, including Apollo,” Lifetouch stated in its assertion Friday. “Apollo and its funds also have no role in Lifetouch’s daily operations and have no access to student images.”
The canceled faculty photos are one other ripple impact over the discharge of thousands and thousands of information from the Epstein investigation, together with paperwork exhibiting Epstein’s common contacts with CEOs, journalists, scientists and outstanding politicians lengthy after a 2008 conviction on intercourse crimes expenses.
Within the small Texas city of Malakoff, the native faculty district canceled a scholar image day after a number of dad and mom advised the district they weren’t comfy with Lifetouch photographing their kids, spokesperson Katherine Smith stated in an announcement e-mailed Friday. A number of different faculties and districts in Texas additionally canceled or modified plans, in addition to a constitution faculty in Arizona, in line with Fb bulletins posted by the colleges.
“We decided our students and families would be best served by keeping all of our pictures in-house for the rest of this year, and we are looking at all of our options for the 2026-2027 school year,” Smith stated.
Dad and mom involved about Lifetouch included MaKallie Gann, whose kids attend faculties in Howe, about 60 miles (97 kilometers) north of Dallas. She stated she was fearful about how a lot info Lifetouch collects on college students.
“Whenever you order the pictures, it has their name. It has the age, of course. It has their grade, their teacher, the school that they’re in,” she stated.
The evaluate exhibits Black’s identify appeared 8,200 occasions, although that determine probably contains some duplicate data. Black stepped down as Apollo’s CEO in March 2021, saying he wished to deal with his household, well being, and “many other interests.”
That was two months after a committee of the corporate’s board issued a report concluding that Epstein had suggested Black personally on property planning, tax points, charitable giving and working his “family office,” however supplied no companies to Apollo or invested in no Apollo funds.
The report additionally stated the evaluate — which Black requested — discovered “no evidence” that he was concerned with Epstein’s alleged felony actions “in any way” or “at any time.”
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Hanna reported from Topeka, Kansas. Additionally contributing was Related Press author Jack Dura in Bismarck, North Dakota.
