WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — A decade ago, Florida financier Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to sex crimes involving underage girls and got 13 months behind bars. What the public and his accusers didn't know at the time was that he had secretly struck a deal with federal prosecutors that spared him from charges that could have put him away for the rest of his life.

When the deal finally came to light years later, it immediately raised suspicions that Epstein — a man who counted Bill Clinton and Donald Trump among his friends and had some of the finest legal talent in America as his lawyers — ha...