A British banker who claimed to have uncovered ties between Jeffrey Epstein and U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick died from hanging in Thailand, according to the Daily Mail.
Simon Andriesz, 57, was found dead in a town just outside Bangkok on the morning of Sept. 23. The municipality office of Khlong Luang Town recorded his death, listing the cause as “asphyxiation from hanging.”
Andriesz, who previously worked on Wall Street but had recently been living in Cornwall, alleged that his former boss Lutnick, a key aide to President Trump, failed to disclose a business relationship with Epstein. Andriesz said he found emails from 2018 that he claimed showed Lutnick and Epstein discussing a start-up business they were involved in.
Those messages were exchanged a decade after Epstein’s 2008 conviction for soliciting prostitution from a child. Epstein died in prison the following year.
Andriesz shared his findings, drawn from the Epstein files, with members of the House Oversight Committee before Lutnick appeared before the panel in May. He claimed the goal was to commercially exploit contacts made by former U.K. trade envoy Andrew through a £1 million loan to “basically buy a prince.” Lutnick was friends with Andrew’s ex-wife Sarah Ferguson and attended their daughter Princess Eugenie’s wedding in 2018, but the deal never happened.
Lutnick has said he only learned this year that Epstein had been an investor in the firm, and the Commerce Department said there was no evidence of wrongdoing. Lutnick has previously said he met Epstein three times and has condemned Epstein’s conduct, saying survivors “deserve our respect and support.”
Andriesz served as managing director at BGC Group, formerly BGC Partners, where Lutnick was chief executive. He spent 35 years in the securities industry before being fired in 2017. He was also named in the Epstein files in connection with FBI interviews he gave while in a dispute with BGC over alleged accounting irregularities.
BGC has called his allegations “categorically false,” saying they remained unsubstantiated after investigations in several jurisdictions, and has said he was fired after refusing medical advice, declining reasonable accommodation and abandoning his role. A BGC spokesman said this week the company does not intend to relitigate the matter and offered condolences to his family.
In a statement, Andriesz’s family described him as a much-loved husband, father, brother, son and friend with “a very strong sense of right and wrong,” and asked for privacy for his son and loved ones. A friend, John Robertson, has launched a GoFundMe page with a £35,000 goal to support his son’s future.
The case has put Britain’s Financial Conduct Authority under fire. Andriesz had said he felt “thoroughly let down” by the watchdog after sending it evidence of alleged retaliation. Lawmakers have called for an investigation into how the FCA treats whistleblowers, and FCA chairman Ashley Alder faced calls to resign at the agency’s annual public meeting.
Labour MP John McDonnell called the death a “profound and preventable tragedy.” The FCA said it has asked new board member Lea Paterson to review its dealings with Andriesz.
In July, the White House said in a statement to the BBC that Lutnick “has been the most consequential Commerce Secretary in modern history.”
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