Longtime OSU Wexner Medical Center doctor received payments from Epstein

Over the weekend, one Redditor highlighted the presence of Dr. Mark Landon in newly released documents contained in the Justice Department’s Epstein files – a massive, searchable public database recording the criminal activities and sprawling social network of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, who died by suicide in his New York City jail cell in August 2019.

Landon, the chair of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Ohio State University College of Medicine and a faculty member at Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center since 1987, received thousands of dollars in payments from Epstein and his associates, according to documents, which among other things include an email sent between Epstein and his longtime personal attorney, Darren Indyke.

In the email, Indyke questions Epstein about the status of Landon’s contract, asking for information about the frequency and amount of the payments due to the doctor, who said in a statement that he was then a paid consultant for the New York Strategy Group. The Justice Department files also contain a memo dated for 2005 with a reminder that “Dr. Landon’s $25k quarterly payment is due, please approve,” in addition to a series of FedEx receipts recording quarterly deliveries to Landon at a Columbus address on Parkview Avenue.

“I did not provide any clinical care for Jeffrey Epstein or any of his victims,” Landon wrote in a statement issued in response to an interview request sent by Matter News to the Wexner Medical Center, which declined further comment. “I was a paid consultant for the New York Strategy Group regarding potential biotech investments from 2001 to 2005. I had no knowledge of any criminal activities; I find them reprehensible and I feel terrible for Epstein’s victims.” 

The connection between Landon and Epstein surfaces at a time when Epstein’s ties to Columbus have come under greater scrutiny, and in particular his relationship to L Brands founder Les Wexner, whose thrall over the city’s business and civic leadership is evident in this 2022 Columbus Monthly feature. (“You have to go a long way down the city’s power structure to find someone willing to criticize Wexner’s connections to Epstein on the record,” writes Dave Ghose.)

More recently, D.J. Byrnes of the Rooster has reported heavily on the ties between Wexner and Ohio State, which in January rejected a request to remove Wexner’s name from the Woody Hayes Athletic Center, and whose Board of Trustees is chaired by John Zeiger, Wexner’s longtime personal attorney.