"I Knew Jekyll. I Didn't Know Hyde": Leon Black Walks Out of His Own Epstein Hearing — and Gets Subpoenaed for It

Billionaire investor Leon Black came to Capitol Hill on Friday by his own choice, sat down before the House Oversight Committee for what its chairman had called the potential "most groundbreaking" interview in the entire Jeffrey Epstein investigation, gave a carefully worded opening statement denying any wrongdoing — and then walked out before the questioning was finished. By the time he reached the Rayburn House Office Building's exit, Chairman James Comer had already decided what would happen next: two subpoenas, one demanding every non-disclosure agreement Black is party to, the other compelling him back for a sworn deposition on July 16.

This is the fullest picture available of what happened inside that closed-door room, what Black actually said before he left, and why his abrupt exit has become, in the words of one Democratic lawmaker on the panel, "extremely telling."

What Black Said Before He Left

Black arrived at the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Friday, June 26, framing his appearance from the outset as an act of voluntary cooperation rather than compulsion. "I come here today voluntarily to set the record straight about my relationship with Jeffrey Epstein and, in particular, why I paid him the money I did," Black said in his prepared opening statement, a copy of which was obtained by CNBC.

What followed was a direct, sweeping denial of every category of allegation that has attached itself to his name over the past several years of Epstein-related congressional and media scrutiny. "Let me state unequivocally that I have never abused a woman," Black said. "I have never been with an underage woman. I have never engaged in sex trafficking. I have never paid Epstein for access to women. I was never blackmailed by Epstein." He went further, characterizing the specific allegations referred to the committee by Senator Ron Wyden as "rank speculation."

On the substance of why he paid Epstein at all — payments that totaled $158 million between 2012 and 2017, according to a 2021 external review commissioned by Apollo Global Management, the private equity firm Black co-founded and led as CEO — Black offered an explanation rooted in estate and tax planning rather than anything untoward. "Epstein solved a massive estate problem for me, that none of the experts and lawyers I consulted had been able to solve," Black told the committee. "It was a problem that would have destroyed enormous value for my family and in Apollo, the company I had founded." He attributed his willingness to engage Epstein, despite Epstein's 2008 conviction for soliciting prostitution from a minor, in part to what he described as Epstein's "unrivaled network of relationships" with influential figures — and he offered the line that has become the defining quote of the entire hearing: "I knew Jekyll. I didn't know Hyde," explaining that he had been misled by what his statement described as Epstein's Jekyll-and-Hyde personality, and adding, "With the benefit of hindsight, I now know, as does the world, that Epstein was engaged in horrific, sordid activities."

Why He Walked Out

The hearing's central rupture came over a specific and narrow category of documents: non-disclosure agreements that Black is reportedly party to, allegedly concluded with women, according to members of the committee. According to Comer, Black simply declined to engage with the committee's questions on the subject. "His response was that he wasn't allowed to discuss the terms of the NDAs," Comer told reporters afterward.

That refusal was enough to end the session. Comer was unambiguous about the sequence of events: "I will remind everyone that Mr. Black came in voluntarily, but they are refusing to disclose that, so I have issued the subpoena, and we are handing it to him as we speak." The two subpoenas Comer issued compel Black to produce the purported NDAs he was questioned about, and to appear for a formal deposition on July 16 — a considerably more legally binding posture than the voluntary, closed-door transcribed interview he had just walked out of. "This is very important for our investigation," Comer said. "We knew for a long time there were NDAs out there by various people. Obviously, they're very hard to obtain, and with this subpoena, we expect to get those NDAs in hand."

Democratic members of the panel described the walkout in starker terms than their Republican chairman. Rep. Suhas Subramanyam of Virginia told reporters, "This is the first time that someone actually walked out in the middle of [an interview], and it's because we had very important questions about Leon Black's past with Jeffrey Epstein." He added a detail capturing his own reaction to Black's tone throughout the session: "This is also the first time I heard someone gush poetically about how smart and how great Jeffrey Epstein was." Asked to characterize Black's demeanor, Subramanyam offered a single word: "He was smug." Rep. Yassamin Ansari of Arizona was similarly direct: "I think the fact that Leon Black left today is extremely telling." Ranking member Rep. Robert Garcia of California backed Comer's decision to subpoena, framing the stakes plainly: "The NDAs are central to us understanding what actually happened. There are real accusations, and there are survivors who have accused Mr. [Black]" — his comment trailing into the broader point that the documents Black refused to discuss are not a peripheral matter but central to the committee's ability to establish what actually transpired between him and Epstein.

The Allegations Behind the Subpoena

Black's appearance did not emerge from nowhere — it followed directly from a referral made earlier this month by Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, who forwarded the findings of a nearly four-year investigation into Black to the House committee. Wyden's allegations go considerably further than the broad characterization of Black as merely a wealthy Epstein associate. "Epstein even appears to have acted as a middleman for Black to pay women on Black's behalf," Wyden wrote, and separately suggested, "This suggests that Epstein may have extorted Black or performed other unseemly tasks on his behalf."

Black's attorneys have pushed back forcefully against Wyden specifically, accusing the senator of harassment and insisting their client has cooperated "voluntarily and without compulsion" throughout the broader Epstein inquiry. In an April 2026 letter to Wyden, Black's lawyers wrote: "We are aware of no other private citizen subjected to more written requests from you over the same period," and characterized Wyden's continued inquiries as "appear[ing] targeted to unfairly harass Mr. Black in a manner that completely disregards the proper scope of Congress's investigative powers."

The 2021 external review commissioned by Apollo — conducted after Black's payments to Epstein became public and forced his departure as CEO of the firm he founded — concluded that the payments were compensation proportional to value Epstein had genuinely delivered, finding that Epstein "provided advice that conferred more than $1 billion and as much as $2 billion or more in value to Black," and characterizing the payments as covering "bona fide tax, estate planning and other related services." That review remains the foundational document underpinning Black's public defense of the $158 million he sent Epstein's way over five years, even as he maintained no personal knowledge of Epstein's crimes until 2019.

Black's name has also surfaced in the broader documentary record of the federal Epstein files released by the Department of Justice, and in a collection of birthday messages sent to Epstein that the House committee itself released last year — including, notably, a poem attributed to Black that referenced "Blond, Red or Brunette, spread out geographically," a detail that has circulated as evidence, in critics' eyes, of an uncomfortably casual familiarity with the world Epstein inhabited. Comer has separately said that Epstein's former accountant, Richard Kahn, testified to lawmakers earlier this year that Epstein received significant sums from a number of high-profile individuals, with Black named among them.

The Broader Congressional Investigation

Black's interview is one episode in a much larger, sustained House Oversight Committee investigation into Epstein's network and the government's handling of its investigation into him — a probe that has already brought in an extraordinary roster of high-profile witnesses. Former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have both appeared before the committee in connection with the inquiry, as have Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, former Attorney General Pam Bondi, and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, among others. Bondi's own testimony reportedly addressed the chaotic federal release of Epstein-related files earlier this year — a process that, as covered extensively elsewhere, included the unintentional disclosure of victim-identifying information and generated its own separate wave of controversy over redaction failures and missing documents.

Comer had set expectations for Friday's session well in advance, telling reporters beforehand that Black's interview "has the potential to be the most groundbreaking of all depositions" conducted as part of the probe — a characterization that, in light of how the session actually concluded, now reads as either prescient or simply premature, depending on what the subpoenaed NDAs ultimately reveal.

What Happens Next

With the subpoenas now formally issued and served, Black faces a binding legal obligation to produce the disputed non-disclosure agreements and to appear before the committee again on July 16 — this time not as a voluntary witness free to end the session on his own terms, but under compulsion, with the considerably higher legal stakes that accompany defiance of a congressional subpoena. Whether the NDAs themselves, once obtained, substantiate Wyden's characterization of Epstein as a "middleman" facilitating payments to women on Black's behalf, or instead support the narrower account Black has given — that they govern matters entirely unrelated to the allegations driving this investigation — remains the single most consequential open question the committee is now positioned to resolve.

For now, what is certain is this: a man who chose to appear voluntarily, who opened his testimony by insisting he wanted to "set the record straight," ended his afternoon on Capitol Hill being served the very compulsory process he had presumably hoped his voluntary cooperation would render unnecessary. The committee's investigation continues. Black's July 16 deposition now looms as its next, considerably less optional, chapter.

Sources

1. ABC News — Comer subpoenas Leon Black after his refusal to answer some Epstein questions from panel
2. CNBC — Leon Black refuses to answer questions on NDAs at Jeffrey Epstein hearing, Rep. Comer says
3. Bloomberg — Leon Black Subpoenaed by House Panel Over Epstein-Related NDAs
4. Associated Press (via 2news.com) — Lawmakers subpoena billionaire Leon Black after contentious interview on Epstein payments