In 1998, Jeffrey Epstein purchased an island of the coast of St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands.  The island known officially as Little St. James is roughly 78 acres that was sold to Epstein through his LLC called L.S.J for $7.95 million.  In 2016, he bought the larger neighboring island, Great St. James, for $18 million.  Construction on Great St. James never began as Epstein was forced to stop due to the fact that he was not obeying environmental laws with his plans.  But Little St. James was fully established as his nightmarish paradise getaway.  The island had been nicknamed by locals as the Island of Sin.  With a nickname like that, it’s a wonder it took so long for an investigation into the property to take place.

On August 12, two days after Jeffrey Epstein was found dead in his New York jail cell his Little St. James mansion and compound were raided, and YouTuber Rusty Shackleford was on hand to film it with his camera equipped drone.  Rusty established his YouTube channel in April of 2019 and began posting drone footage of Little St. James in July.  Since his first post in July Rusty has uploaded around 30 more videos taken with his drone of the private island racking up close to 5 million views.

The videos give an in depth view into the island and it’s structures which include the blue roofed villa style mansion, multiple cabanas and bathhouses, guest houses, a temple like structure with doors that appear to be designed to keep people trapped inside, along with other recreational buildings.  Rusty also shows the surrounding maintenance building and areas occupied by staff residing on the island.  One of the most popular videos he has posted is the one in which his drone happened upon the NYPD and FBI going through the mansion apparently in search of evidence.

The video starts off much like the rest of Rusty’s videos with his drone sweeping over the crystal blue waters as it approaches the mansion perched on a cliff.  In the background you can see a large hill dotted with palm trees and an American flag blowing in the breeze.  The drone repositions its flight and slowly comes in closer to the house.  Seagulls swoop in and out of the shot as the drone continues to approach a large window to the corner of the house.  Within moments you can see shadows of silhouettes moving behind the window.  It seems as if Rusty is trying to keep whomever is inside the house unaware of the presence of his drone.  Then you see a man glace up out of the window at the drone. 

The man behind the window, with his gun holstered at his hip, begins talking to someone on a walkie-talkie while repeatedly glancing up at the drone.  Rusty seems to retreat for a moment, then with the realization that he has been fully spotted decides to bring his drone level with the window to get as good as a view as possible before he is inevitably stopped.  Once level with the window the officer continues looking back and forth at the drone while talking on his hand radio.  You can also see both male and female agents wearing NYPD and FBI uniforms walking about with boxes.  The video only lasts about 5 minutes, long enough for the officer on the walkie-talkie to see to it that black drop cloths and cardboard boxes are placed over the window to obstruct the drone’s view.

On Rusty’s channel he doesn’t have any personal information or what type of drone he uses.  As there is no bio, we don’t actually know if Rusty is his real name (it could even be a woman).  The name “Rusty Shackleford” could just be an homage to his favorite TV character from the show King Of The Hill, a very patriotic character.  According to some of the video descriptions, Rusty identifies as a devout American patriot.  What we do know is that he clearly lives within proximity to Little St. James island based on the amount of videos he has been able to capture with his drone.

Though it is assumed authorities will uncover mountains of evidence in Epstein’s Little St. James villa, no reports have been released as to what has been found.  Epstein also had a 7 story mansion on East 71st St. in New York City, a $12 million estate in Palm Beach, FL, a 7,500-acre ranch in New Mexico, and an apartment with very little known information about it on Avenue Foch in Paris, FR.