Was a video showing a terrified woman pleading for help as she is tortured in a tank filling with water from the Epstein files or from the movie "The Cell"? No, that's not true: There is no evidence of an association between the video and Jeffrey Epstein, his island or the movie. The video went viral on social media in February 2026, shortly after a large batch of files about Epstein was released by the Department of Justice. There is no record of this video in the Epstein files or in the news.
The video resurfaced in a post (archived here) by the @smolfsmolf7 account on X on Aug. 15, 2026. The post was captioned:
One of the most horrifying scenes recorded on Jeffrey Epstein's island--something the far-left media once tried to dismiss as staged--was a Satanic ritual performed on women at the site. The truth must be exposed to the world, and those involved held accountable. SHARE THIS SO THE WORLD KNOWS ABOUT THESE HORRIFIC ACTS.
This is what a screenshot of the video looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Image source: post by @smolfsmolf7 on X.)
Reverse image searches on Google Lens (archived here), Yandex, Bing and TinEye produced no relevant results pointing to the video's source -- only duplicate copies previously published without sourcing. The video circulated widely on X on Feb. 13 and 14, 2026, as shown in this summary from X Community Notes. Some of these posts (one archived here) retweeted a @Lordnewsbrasil post that no longer exists.
No clear connection to the Epstein Library
For context, this video originally went viral shortly after a large Department of Justice (DOJ) release of Epstein files on Jan. 30, 2026. A press release (archived here) from the DOJ begins:
WASHINGTON - The Department of Justice today published over 3 million additional pages responsive to the Epstein Files Transparency Act, which was signed into law by President Trump on November 19, 2025.
More than 2,000 videos and 180,000 images are included in today's additional publication. Combined with prior releases, this makes the total production nearly 3.5 million pages released in compliance with the Act.
After this DOJ release of files, the internet was flooded with fake images and videos claiming to be from the files. Lead Stories published many fact checks about Epstein file hoaxes circulating at the time. Although the Epstein Library is searchable and public (archived here), images and videos are not catalogued in a way that is readily accessible for verification. San Diego State University published a helpful guide to navigating the files (archived here).
Because every file has a number, the most obvious way to refer to or share files would be to include the file number from the DOJ database. This video went viral without a file number and more than six months later it is still circulating without one. There is also no credible news reporting about this specific video -- such reporting, if it existed, would appear near the top of reverse image search results.
At the bottom of the video frame is a watermark: @epstein_leakedvideos. At the time of writing Lead Stories was unable to find an account matching that handle on X, YouTube, TikTok, Facebook or Instagram. While searching for the source of this video, we never encountered any screenshots of posts made by an account with that handle. The watermark appears to have been applied to this video to suggest it came from an account dedicated to circulating material from the DOJ Epstein Library or some other source tied to Epstein.
A mysterious second angle, but no source
Lead Stories found a copy of the video (archived here) that was published by @aaryankelvinshorts05 on YouTube on Feb. 12, 2026. Aside from the earlier date, there are three clues that this video is closer to the original source than the copies shared on X. It has a sharper focus -- for example, the water drops and smears on the glass are clear to see. There is more of the picture visible in the frame -- to the right side there are several more buckets visible on the floor. And the @epstein_leakedvideos watermark is not present on this copy of the video. But it still does not point to a source. The video, titled "Epstein Files #eps," had a text caption:
Does anyone know where this video is from?
(Image source: post by @aaryankelvinshorts05 on YouTube.)
Using this image from YouTube, a reverse image search with Google Lens (archived here) turned up a notable close match that was not a duplicate of the X video. It appeared as an illustration in an installment of a romantic fiction serial published in Arabic on July 13, 2022. It was published on the website Wattpad without crediting an image source. This image (pictured below) is grainy and out of focus, but it appears to show a different angle of the same glass chamber in the same industrial room. The reinforcing clips on the corners of the glass container, the windows high on the wall and the shape of the hose nozzle all appear to match what is visible in the video circulating on X. The words of the author (translated by Google) suggest that the image was not produced for the fiction story, but was selected to represent it.
This is the closest image I have of Shaghaf's situation, for those who didn't understand my description.
...to be continued
Lead Stories has reached out to this author and will update if a source is discovered.
(Image source: post by @MoaaMoaa622 on Wattpad.)
Is this scene from 'The Cell'? No
There has been an X Community Note added under the video (about Community Notes). This note (ID 2088930297303765419) was written by an "experimental AI contributor". The note (pictured below) says:
This video is a scene from the 2000 psychological thriller film 'The Cell,' not footage from Jeffrey Epstein's island. The glass water-tank device is the film's signature murder set piece, identifiable by multiple film databases. https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Film/TheCell
This is what the community note looked like on X at the time of writing:
(Image source: community note on X.)
The film "The Cell" does include a chamber that fills with water, but the chamber is the size of a jail cell, not a telephone booth. A scene (pictured below) at the 1-minute, 32-second mark in the original trailer published on YouTube (archived here), shows there are two glass walls and two tiled walls. The water fills from an overhead sprinkler, not a hose hung over the wall. Additional images of the chamber appear in the IMDb slideshow: slides one, nine and 138-141 (archived here).The chamber in the video on X does not resemble what appears in the movie "The Cell".
The 2021 short film "Aquaphobia" features a telephone-booth-sized chamber (not pictured) but it is not the same design as the one in the X video (archived here).
(Image source: 'The Cell' trailer on YouTube.)
