The board of directors for ARMI, the government-funded Manchester research project led by inventor Dean Kamen, says it will investigate its founder following newly released records showing Kamen maintained a personal relationship with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“The Board accepts Dean’s recusal from all Board activities while an independent review is conducted, and ARMI will sustain its focus on its mission to transform the future of human health,” the board said in a statement posted to ARMI’s website.
The release of records by the U.S. Department of Justice last week, part of disclosure of the so-called “Epstein files,” documented a yearslong relationship between Epstein and Kamen, including the exchange of professional favors, phone calls and emails, and a joint visit to Epstein’s Caribbean island.
The disclosure has resulted in several of the organizations Kamen leads or had founded to review its ties to him. Last weekend, FIRST, the youth-based robotics organization Kamen founded decades ago, announced it was going to hire an outside law firm to review his conduct while he takes a leave of absence.
Kamen hasn’t been accused of criminal wrongdoing related to his interactions with Epstein, which appears to have developed in the years after Epstein was convicted of sex crimes against minors in 2008.
Read more: 'Thank you for . . . an incredible visit': New docs show Kamen spent time on Epstein's island
Stefany Shaheen, a Democratic candidate for United States Congress in New Hampshire who has been paid hundreds of thousands of dollars as a consultant for ARMI in recent years, said Monday that ARMI’s board of directors “needs to address this matter independently.” A campaign spokesperson said Shaheen ended her work for ARMI in January, though she remains listed on the group’s website as its chief strategy officer as of Thursday evening.
In addition to his formal titles of executive director and board chairman, Kamen has served as the public face and loudest booster at the Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute, or ARMI, the government-funded research project based in Manchester that is attempting to kickstart medical breakthroughs in tissue and organ science. Since 2016, Kamen has helped secure hundreds of millions of dollars from the federal government for ARMI’s work. He also essentially serves as ARMI’s landlord across multiple buildings he owns in the city's millyard, collecting millions of dollars in rent from the project over the past several years.
Kamen has not responded to several requests for comment from NHPR in recent days. But in a statement provided to WMUR over the weekend, Kamen said that he has “no knowledge of any of the horrific crimes of Jeffrey Epstein or his associates other than what I have learned from news reports. In addition to crossing paths at various conferences and events, Jeffrey Epstein reached out to me to become involved in my projects to bring clean water and distributed power to developing countries by offering resources and introductions to the leaders of those countries.”
Kamen’s statement continued: “After initial meetings, it became apparent that his only interest was self-promotion and I avoided further meetings. Given what is known now, I of course regret even those limited interactions. I will defer all further comment on this topic until the conclusion of the independent review."
In addition to his nonprofit work, Kamen is also on the board of directors of Beta Technologies, a Vermont-based publicly traded company that designs electric aircraft. NHPR reached out to the company about Kamen’s continued role at the firm, but did not receive a response.
Kamen is also listed as a member of the board of trustees for the X Prize Foundation, a group that uses prizes to spur innovation in a range of fields. The foundation said Wednesday that Kamen was part of an informal advisory group, but that given his leave of absence from FIRST, he is no longer involved.
(Editor's note: this story was updated Feb. 5 following ARMI's announcement it was launching a formal review of Kamen.)
