A Manhattan federal judge on Thursday denied Jeffrey Epstein’s request to be released on bail ahead of a trial on child sex trafficking and conspiracy charges, saying that the financier’s penchant for sex with underage girls appeared to be “uncontrollable.”

In a written order posted late Thursday, U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman of the Southern District of New York stated the reasoning behind his ruling earlier in the day, which rejected a proposed bail package that would have allowed Epstein to wait out the trial at his townhouse on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.