Penn Psychology professor and Director of the Undergraduate Honors Program Coren Apicella approached Jeffrey Epstein’s foundation for research funding in 2012, four years after his first conviction, according to a newly released email exchange.
The email — which looked to garner funding for Apicella’s Human Behavioral Origins laboratory — was originally sent to Epstein’s foundation and forwarded to his personal email alongside a note describing the offer as “interesting.” Apicella personally thanked Epstein for “indirectly” supporting some of her previous research endeavors in the Nov. 15, 2012 message.
“I never knew Jeffrey Epstein,” Apicella wrote in a statement to The Daily Pennsylvanian. “I sent a single email to the Epstein Foundation in 2012 to ask whether it was accepting grant proposals. I received no follow-up correspondence or funding and I was certainly not aware of any of his horrific crimes when I sent the email.”
The email exchange is one of thousands of files released by the Department of Justice earlier this month. Apicella has not been accused of any wrongdoing in connection with Epstein or his crimes.
In the 2012 message, Apicella described herself as “closely allied” with “PED” at Harvard University. In 2003, Harvard’s Program for Evolutionary Dynamics received a $6.5 million donation from Epstein.
“I would love to hear more about your foundation and possible opportunities for funding either now or in the future,” she wrote to Epstein. “Please do keep me on your email lists and radar.”
In the email, Apicella explained that she hoped to study the Hadza bushmen of Northern Tanzania — and noted that her research “fits with some of the interests” of Epstein’s foundation. She added that she wanted to “devote much time to studying them despite the financial, physical (and emotional) challenges of such fieldwork.”
The J. Epstein VI Foundation was created in 2000 to support scientific research.
According to the email, Apicella “was looking at various funding opportunities” when Epstein's “foundation came to mind.”
“With cutbacks in science funding I am beginning to realize I need to cast my net wider than the usual channels,” she wrote.
In 2019, The New York Times conducted an investigation that concluded the foundation has been used to “improve” Epstein’s relationship. In 2008 — the same year Epstein was convicted of soliciting prostitution from a minor — the foundation lost its tax-exempt status for “an unknown reason.”
Researchers across the country previously solicited donations from Epstein, including several scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard, and Princeton University.
Staff reporter Lavanya Mani covers legal affairs and can be reached at mani@thedp.com. At Penn, she studies English. Follow her on X @lavanyamani_.
