‘Boys from the Bronx’: Emails show UCLA professor Mark Tramo standing by Jeffrey Epstein

In academia, loyalty is usually reserved for ideas, not indicted billionaires. But newly surfaced emails suggest a UCLA neuroscience professor once pledged allegiance to Jeffrey Epstein — even after learning the disgraced financier was preparing to plead guilty to soliciting a minor. Calling themselves “boys from The Bronx,” the professor framed friendship as thicker than scandal, law enforcement or, it seems, common sense.


Newly unearthed emails showed that Professor Mark Tramo of UCLA pledged loyalty to Jeffrey Epstein after learning he planned to plead guilty to soliciting prostitution from a minor. The message, sent after Tramo read media reports of the impending plea, referred to them as “boys from The Bronx”, emphasising their bond, New York Post reported.




“I read the newspapers this morning. … Please remind him that boys from The Bronx (even if they end up at Harvard) have long memories, know all about cops, and stay true to their friends through thick and thin (no less peccadilloes),” Tramo wrote.

Epstein served a 13-month sentence for the solicitation charges. He was also charged with sex trafficking of minors and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of minors in July 2019 and died in jail two months later.

In a statement to the Harvard Crimson, Tramo denied knowing the full extent of Epstein’s conduct in 2006–2007, saying he had been “duped to believe” the offences were minor. He added, “I never visited Epstein’s island, never flew on his planes, and never saw him with young girls.”

In a 2018 email, Tramo offered to analyse Kanye West’s meeting with President Trump for Epstein “given your interest in creativity”. Records suggest the Institute for Music and Brain Science, founded by Tramo, received grants from the Jeffrey Epstein VI Foundation between 2010 and 2012. A UCLA spokesperson told the Daily Bruin the university had no records of gifts from that foundation.

Student reactions were mixed. “You can’t say that you didn’t know what was going on if then you’re still contacting him past his initial arrest,” one student said on condition of anonymity. Grace Wang, who took Tramo’s class in fall 2025, said the emails did not indicate a close connection to Epstein, adding that the professor seemed inclined to email anyone “of even remote interest to him.”

The trove of documents was released by the Department of Justice under a bipartisan mandate and includes FBI files, court records and photographs, though large sections remain heavily redacted to protect victims. In a letter to lawmakers, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche said teams of attorneys had reviewed hundreds of thousands of pages of material to determine what could legally be disclosed. More Epstein-related material is expected in the coming weeks.