James Staley, former CEO of Barclays and executive at JPMorgan Chase, has been banned from holding senior roles in U.K. financials services for failing to disclose his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein committed suicide in 2019 while awaiting trial on charges of sexually assaulting minors, according to a report by CNN.
The Financial Conduct Authority of U.K. also fined Staley $2.2 million in addition to banning him from holding “a senior management or significant influence function” in banking.
Staley claimed in a letter to the FCA that he did not have a close relationship with Epstein, but emails between the two revealed he considered Epstein a “most cherished” friend. In addition, Staley said he stopped contact with Epstein prior to joining Barclays in December 2015, but this was shown to be false.
“It is right to prevent him from holding a senior position in the financial services industry if we cannot rely on him to act with integrity by disclosing uncomfortable truths about his close personal relationship with Mr. Epstein,” Therese Chambers, joint executive director of enforcement and market oversight at FCA, said in the report.
“If I had known who [Epstein] really was, there is absolutely no doubt that I wouldn’t be in the position I am in today,” Staley said in the report.
