SANTA FE – New Mexico’s commissioner of public lands is announcing plans to terminate livestock grazing leases to a holding company controlled by financier Jeffrey Epstein before his death last month.
First-year Land Commissioner Stephanie Garcia Richard scheduled a morning news conference Wednesday to announce the cancellation of two leases to Cypress, Inc.
Epstein killed himself Aug. 10 in a New York jail cell while awaiting his sex trafficking trial. He owned an isolated hilltop mansion and ranch in central New Mexico.
A small portion of the ranch extended across state trust land under a 1990s-era contract with the State Land Office that was renewed as recently as 2016.
New Mexico’s attorney general says the state trust land was leased to provide privacy and barely if ever was used for grazing livestock.
