Stuff story about ‘Epstein’s yacht’ in Auckland appears in FBI emails
Tuesday, 3 February 2026
A Stuff story has been referenced in an FBI email exchange about Jeffrey Epstein, documents released by the US Department of Justice show.
In 2020, Stuff reported that a yacht named the Dancing Hare had docked in Auckland’s Viaduct Harbour. The 58m vessel was previously owned by Robert Maxwell, the father of Epstein’s romantic partner Ghislaine Maxwell.
In 2022, Ghislaine was sentenced to a 20-year prison term after being found guilty of child sex trafficking and other offences in connection with Epstein, who had died by suicide three years earlier while awaiting trial.
Staff on the Dancing Hare, which was previously named Lady Ghislane, declined to speak with Stuff at the time of the story in June 2020, and wouldn’t confirm who was aboard.
The story later appeared in a December 2021 email exchange involving the FBI - an exchange that has now been made public as part of the millions of files related to Epstein released over the weekend.
The communications, which took place a year and a half after Ghislaine’s arrest, show a person - whose name is redacted - asking an FBI official about “Epstein’s yacht,” which the person said was “parked down here in Palau,” an island country in the western Pacific.
“Not sure if the Case Agents care or if there is any kind of seizure order floating out there,” the email continues. “Even if you could tell me a POC [Point of Contact] for the case I can send it their way.”
The FBI official, whose name has been redacted but is identified in the email as the Assistant Legal Attaché of Intelligence for Legat Canberra, responds: “If the site I’ve linked below [a marine tracking site] is to be believed, this yacht is RMI [Republic of the Marshall Islands] flagged and spend most of the past year docked in Westhaven, NZ, on the outskirts of Auckland.”
The official continues: “Other open sources corroborate that the ship spent a lot of time since at least the beginning of 2020 docked in various ports throughout NZ. The ship has been tracked with enthusiasm by conspiracy theorist-types due to its association with Ghislaine Maxwell … The current owner of the ship is a little murky, but I can chat with you about the phone if you’re interested and have any time.”
The official then includes a link to the Stuff story about the yacht in Auckland. Another story showed it docked in Wellington, after first arriving in Dunedin, earlier the same year.
In another email, a person whose name is redacted, but who identifies themselves as “the current ALAT [Assistant Legal Attaché] covering the Compact States for Legat Canberra”, says they have “no idea” if the email recipient cared about the vessel, but “I thought I’d bring it to your attention just in case”.
“If you need to search it, seize it, have someone talk to the crew or whatever, just let me know and we can probably facilitate things here on the island,” they said. “If you don’t care, that’s fine too, I’ll just pass along to the government that we don’t have any interest.”
A final email in the chain is from another person whose name is redacted, and whose title doesn’t appear. “Hi - I received the below from ALAT which was likely meant for you, re: Epstein’s yacht in Palau,” they say. “Should I refer him to you?”
No further correspondence is shown in the document.
The superyacht was built in 1986 for Emad Khashoggi, cousin of murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
Robert Maxwell bought it in 1986 and named it after his daughter. When he died in late 1991 after disappearing off the yacht, it was sold and renamed the Lady Mona K.
The yacht was then sold again in 2017, with an asking price of $US14.5 million, and renamed the Dancing Hare.