Unsealed documents shed light on Jeffrey Epstein’s lurid world

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A first tranche of documents released by a New York court on Wednesday provided a fresh glimpse into the lurid world of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein and his dealings with a cast of powerful men, from Wall Street figures to former president Bill Clinton and Britain’s Prince Andrew.

The documents’ publication — ordered by a judge last month after spending years under seal or redacted — had been hotly anticipated by a public still eager to understand the enigma of Epstein and the extent of his crimes.

The first pages are drawn from sworn depositions of women who said he had abused them and offer a wealth of details and first-person accounts. Yet they did not appear to shift the established narrative surrounding Epstein, who was found hanged to death in a New York jail cell in August 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges involving dozens of underage women. He had previously been convicted in Florida of soliciting sex with a minor.

His longtime partner, the British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, was convicted in December 2021 of helping Epstein to procure girls and in some cases abusing them. She was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

The papers emerged from a 2015 civil defamation lawsuit filed against Maxwell by Virginia Giuffre, who has accused Epstein and others of abusing her for years. Many of the allegations have been reported in the years since that suit was filed, and more documents are expected to be made public in the coming days.

As part of that suit, Giuffre testified under oath in May 2016 that Maxwell had ordered her to provide sex to Bill Richardson, the former New Mexico governor, Glenn Dubin, a billionaire New York hedge fund manager, and Jean-Luc Brunel, a French model agency owner, among others.

“When they say massage, that means erotic, okay? That’s their term for it,” Giuffre told the lawyers, according to a transcript.

Richardson is now deceased, as is Brunel, who died in a jail cell in France while under investigation for rape and sexual abuse. Dubin, who is married to Eva Andersson-Dubin, a former Miss Sweden who once dated Epstein, has denied the claims.

Giuffre said she was also told to provide a massage to Prince Andrew, who has repeatedly denied her claims. The deposition included further details about a now-infamous photo in which the royal’s arm is wrapped around her waist. She said that Epstein took it with a Kodak camera — in March 2001, she believed — and that she later provided it to the FBI.

The documents included sworn testimony from another Epstein accuser, Johanna Sjoberg, who said Prince Andrew groped her breast when she was just 17, as part of a “joke” involving a puppet of his character on Spitting Image, the British satire TV show. She said the event took place at the late sex offender’s Manhattan mansion. 

A separate accuser, referred to pseudonymously as Jane Doe 3, is cited in the documents as claiming she was forced to have sex with Prince Andrew at in London and New York, as well as at Epstein’s home in the US Virgin Islands, as part of an orgy involving other underage girls.

Prince Andrew, who was forced to step back from royal duties due to the furore over the Epstein scandal, has previously denied all allegations of misconduct. He has settled a separate lawsuit from Giuffre.

Sjoberg also mentioned Clinton in her deposition, alleging that Epstein had told her the former president “likes them young”. Guiffre had previously alleged that she spent time with Clinton on Epstein’s private island — a claim refuted by a former FBI director and denied by Clinton.

Lawyers for Giuffre also petitioned the court to allow them to depose Clinton, because they claimed he was “a key person” who could provide information about his close relationship with Epstein. Their request was ultimately denied.