A United Methodist pastor who served congregations in the Kansas City metro area has been placed on leave after her church learned she spent nearly a year working for convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, and allegedly lied about it on official clergy paperwork for years.
Bishop Robert Farr of the Missouri Conference of The United Methodist Church suspended Rev. Stephanie L. Remington on March 12, pending a formal review by the episcopal office. The 90-day suspension came after the conference discovered Remington’s connection to Epstein and what it called inaccuracies in her annual reports.
This isn’t a case of guilt by association. It’s a case of a clergy member who knowingly took a job with a registered sex offender, then apparently concealed it from her own church for years. The Missouri Conference says it had no idea.
As Fox 4 Kansas City reported, Remington worked as Epstein’s administrative assistant and temporary property manager on Little Saint James, his private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands, from August 2018 to May 2019. Her name appears in approximately 1,800 documents on the U.S. Department of Justice’s Epstein files website. Many of those files are emails discussing her “day-to-day” work operations.
Newsmax reported that Remington served as an administrative assistant from August through December 2018, then shifted to temporary property manager on Little Saint James from January through May 2019.
Just two months after she left, Epstein was arrested in July 2019 for sex trafficking crimes. He was found dead in his cell that August by alleged suicide.
Remington has not denied working for Epstein. She told UM News she knew he was a registered sex offender who had served 18 months for soliciting prostitution from a minor when she accepted the job. But she insists she saw nothing criminal.
Remington told UM News:
“I never saw anything.”
She also said:
“I knew him for the last nine months of his life, well after he served time for the things that he was accused of doing.”
That framing deserves scrutiny. Epstein’s 18-month sentence was widely condemned as a sweetheart deal. The federal sex trafficking charges that came later, charges serious enough to keep him locked in a Manhattan jail cell, suggest his crimes did not end with that earlier plea.
The Epstein connection alone would raise serious questions. But the Missouri Conference says the problems go deeper. The conference said an early review found Remington had not worked for the Lewis Center for Church Leadership at Wesley Theological Seminary for all the years she claimed in annual paperwork.
Here are the key discrepancies the conference identified:
In other words, the church says she filed false paperwork for years, covering up where she actually worked and what she actually did.
The Missouri Conference issued a statement making its position clear. It said it had no prior knowledge of Remington’s ties to Epstein:
“The Missouri Conference had no knowledge of the individual’s association with Mr. Epstein. Clergy serving in extension ministry operate outside a local church appointment and report their ministry setting through annual paperwork submitted to the Conference.”
The conference added that no one in leadership was ever told:
“No information indicating this association was disclosed in any of those reports. The Bishop or district superintendent were not contacted about the individual’s interest in or acceptance of the Epstein-related position.”
The conference also acknowledged the gravity of Epstein’s crimes:
“Clergy are called to uphold the highest standards of spiritual and moral leadership. Concerns of this nature are taken seriously and require careful review.”
“We recognize the deep harm connected to Mr. Epstein’s crimes and remain in prayer for survivors who deserve healing and justice.”
Remington served as a pastor and associate pastor at several churches across Missouri from 2001 to about 2018. Her appointments included First United Methodist Church in North Kansas City and Summit United Methodist Church in Lee’s Summit. Congregants at those churches trusted her with spiritual leadership.
The alleged false documentation, combined with the Epstein ties, led the Missouri Conference to issue the suspension. The 90-day leave gives the episcopal office time to conduct its review.
Several questions still hang over this case:
A 90-day suspension for managing a sex trafficker’s island and allegedly lying about it for years doesn’t exactly scream accountability. Congregations across Missouri deserve to know that the institutions they trust will hold their leaders to the standards they preach, not just when the cameras are rolling.
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