A Christian nonprofit that has attempted to claim ownership of two of Jeffrey Epstein’s homes has received nearly $200,000 in COVID-19 relief loans despite having little evidence of legitimate operations of any kind.
The twentysomething behind it also has a bizarre and disturbing personal history, including, most recently, an allegation that he “karate chopped” his own mother on the neck.
Late last year, Love & Bliss Inc. filed deeds for two of the multimillionaire sex offender’s most notorious properties: his now-demolished Palm Beach mansion and his Zorro ranch outside Santa Fe, New Mexico. A Florida judge junked the claims to the first, and the pedophilic financier’s embattled estate told The Daily Beast it intends to fight the latter land grab in court in the months ahead—and warned that these legal disputes could complicate plans to compensate the infamous abuser’s victims.
But before the self-described “church religious corporation” led by a 22-year-old accused (albeit never prosecuted) domestic abuser and stalker sought to snatch Epstein’s assets, it successfully obtained a loan from the federal government’s Paycheck Protection Program.
Federal records show that Love & Bliss obtained a $97,700 loan via the pandemic assistance initiative in July 2020 which, according to the database maintained by the nonprofit ProPublica, the group reported would help preserve 13 jobs.
But it is unclear how many people Love & Bliss really employs, or what money it normally pays them with. That’s because the organization has not once filed the required annual disclosure with the Internal Revenue Service since it was formed at a residential address near Tampa and St. Petersburg in 2018. The IRS revokes the nonprofit status of noncompliant nonprofits after three years.
The organization also has little presence online, outside a single LinkedIn page that seems to belong to the young man listed in Love & Bliss’s paperwork as president and co-founder, Alex Leszczynski. That page uses a profile photo of a young woman who confirmed to The Daily Beast that she was unfamiliar with the organization or the people behind it. She asked that The Daily Beast withhold her name because of her personal publishing history and involvement in activist causes.
Efforts to reach Alex Leszczynski or Love & Bliss’s two other listed directors, Jeison Garzon and Zachary Leszczynski, were either unsuccessful or received no response. A woman who answered the phone at a number for the latter Leszczynski hung up as soon as The Daily Beast mentioned the two brothers’ names. Subsequent calls went unanswered.
Love & Bliss’s original incorporation materials describe its mission, sloppily, as that of a church and social services group.
“The business activity for said organization is as follows: to help children who have parents or no parents at all that need that loving feeling to have hope in life/similar to mentoring, providing assistance with the less fortunate,” the materials read. “Teaching about worship. And gathering every Sunday for service for about an hr or [sic] more to worship our belief of GOD.”
Just three months after landing the subsidized loan, Love & Bliss filed deeds for the Epstein properties in Palm Beach and New Mexico. Both listed a fictional attorney named John Mayer, Esq., based out of a nonexistent law office in Jacksonville, along with a phone number from Buffalo, New York, whose owner confirmed to The Daily Beast he had no idea why it was used.
Both also bore what they purported to be Epstein’s signature, and were dated a few months before the jet-setting pervert’s 2019 suicide.
Attorneys for the Epstein estate moved to have the Palm Beach deed thrown out, and a judge ruled in their favor in December, finding that Love & Bliss had “has no right, title, or interest in and to the property” because “competent evidence” showed its deed to be fraudulent. In January, Love & Bliss filed another deed for the same El Brillo Way compound—as did Hung Shungli Investment Firm, Ltd., a supposedly Hong Kong-based firm “wholly owned by the Chinese government,” according to paperwork submitted to the county.
In February, a Palm Beach County court threw out both these new filings, declaring them both fraudulent, and describing Hung Shungli Investment as “a fictitious entity” Love & Bliss had invented “for the purpose of improperly clouding title to the property.”
Exactly one week before that judgment dropped, Love & Bliss was approved for a second PPP loan, this one for $98,210, also to preserve 13 jobs. The Small Business Administration, charged with overseeing the recovery program, declined to comment for this story.
The Epstein estate’s legal team told The Daily Beast that Love & Bliss was a no-show in court, and had never made any sort of contact with them either directly or through an attorney. The deceased deviant’s lawyers further asserted they had “incurred significant costs” already to dispose of the false deeds.
“The estate’s funds spent in invalidating Love & Bliss’ fraudulent warranty deeds are by definition not available for any other purpose, including to resolve claims by those alleging sexual abuse by Mr. Epstein through the Epstein Victims’ Compensation Program,” attorney Dan Weiner wrote in an email. “The estate has no idea why Mr. Leszczynski targeted it, and knows of no affiliation between him and anyone associated with Mr. Epstein or the estate.”
This echoes an assertion in the victims fund’s February filing, which states that getting the deeds removed “delayed closing on the estate’s sale of the Palm Beach property.”
Meanwhile, the LinkedIn profile bearing the stolen photo makes extravagant claims about one of the men involved in the operation.
“An experienced nanoengineering and bioengineering researcher with a demonstrated history of working in the research industry. Demonstrated leadership history through start-up, volunteer and co-curricular work,” it reads. “Skilled in complex problem solving, research, written/oral communication, teamwork and collaboration, leadership, negotiation, recruiting, management, and creativity. Professional with a strong research background and demonstrated entrepreneurial interest.”
The public record suggests a less illustrious past: Leszczynski faced two stalking accusations in 2017, the first involving a minor. The second, from that November, alleged he had made “unwanted advances” on a classmate and harassed her via Facebook messenger.
“Victim said she never associated with Alex because he was strange when they were in school and not until recently did he seem normal when they ran into each other,” the police report reads. “The victim was able to print out 32 pages of messages sent by Alex just since October 10, 2017.”
“Alex would talk about his love for the victim in one message and then in the next message he would call her names and make disrespectful comments,” it continues.
The accuser, who did not respond to requests for comment, contacted the police after Leszczynski allegedly had multiple unwanted pizzas delivered to her home. A judge issued a restraining order against him, but authorities ultimately declined to prosecute, stating in a court filing that “that the facts and circumstances revealed do not warrant prosecution at this time.”
In March of this year, police arrested Leszczynski again after he allegedly “karate chopped” his mother on the neck, after accusing her boyfriend of slashing his bicycle tires, according to the police report. His mother did not respond to requests for comment.
Prosecutors again decided not to pursue charges against her son, who by that time was already on the losing end of his fight for disgraced real estate.
