An image shared on Facebook over 2,000 times claims Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates visited convicted sex offender Jeffery Epstein’s private island at least 17 times.

Verdict: False

There is no evidence Gates went to Epstein’s private Caribbean island 17 or more times. Flight logs only show Gates on one flight from New Jersey to Florida.

Fact Check:

Epstein, a financier and convicted sex offender, was found dead in his jail cell at Manhattan’s Metropolitan Correctional Center in August 2019 from what officials deemed a suicide while awaiting trial for federal sex-trafficking charges. While he was still alive, Epstein had connections to rich and powerful people such as Gates, former President Bill Clinton and Prince Andrew, according to Axios.

The viral post claims Gates traveled to Epstein’s private Caribbean island, Little St. James, 17 times via Epstein’s private jet. The island, where some of Epstein’s accusers have said they were sexually assaulted, had been nicknamed “Pedophile Island” by some of the locals, The New York Times reported.

“Before you listen to him about coronavirus always remember he flew to Epstein island at least 17 times,” the post claims. (RELATED: Does A Bill Gates-Funded Research Institute Own The Patent For Coronavirus?)

But there is no evidence to support that claim. The Daily Caller reviewed Epstein’s publicly available flight logs, uploaded online by the websites Gawker and FactCheck.org, and found only one mention of Gates in them. That March 2013 flight went from Teterboro airport in New Jersey to Palm Beach International airport in Florida, not to the U.S. Virgin Islands where his island is located.

In 2019, a spokesperson for Gates told The New York Times that Gates hadn’t been aware that the plane belonged to Epstein.

The New York Times reported that Gates met with Epstein on multiple occasions starting in 2011, just a few years after he had pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitution from a minor. Epstein also met with employees from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, according to The New York Times.

“Bill Gates regrets ever meeting with Epstein and recognizes it was an error in judgment to do so,” said Bridgitt Arnold, a spokeswoman for Gates, to The New York Times. “Gates recognizes that entertaining Epstein’s ideas related to philanthropy gave Epstein an undeserved platform that was at odds with Gates’s personal values and the values of his foundation.”