10 things learned from unsealed Jeffrey Epstein files
From kissing games, stolen passports and Bill Clinton liking “them young”, the Epstein files dropped with both a bang and a whimper. This is what we know from the unsealed court documents.
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Kissing games. Stolen passports. Prince Andrew puppet play and Bill Clinton liking “them young”.
The Jeffrey Epstein sex trafficking court documents dropped with both a bang and a whimper. Explicit details were revealed around some names expected to be on the list. While the many unexpected names were revealed without any explicit details.
Those named either have no suggestion of wrongding, strenuously deny any allegation of wrongdoing, and/or have not been charged with any crimes.
Here are the 10 things learned from the first round of unsealed court documents.
IT’S AS GROSS AS EXPECTED
With nicknames like “The Lolita Express” and “Pedophile Island”, everyone expected allegations against Jeffrey Epstein and his associates would make the skin crawl. And they did.
In her 2015 deposition, accuser Johanna Sjoberg claimed Ghislaine Maxwell showed her a puppet of Prince Andrew.
“They told us to go get on the couch. And so Andrew and Virginia [Giuffre] sat on the couch, and they put the puppet, the puppet on her lap,” she recalled.
“And so then I sat on Andrew’s lap, and I believe on my own volition, and they took the puppet’s hands and put it on Virginia’s breast, and so Andrew put his on mine.”
Prince Andrew has vigorously maintained his innocence and denies the allegations, and has not been charged with any crime.
At one point, she said Epstein asked her to rub his nipples while he masturbated. She did not. Epstein explained why he received so many massages from so many different girls.
“He explained to me that, in his opinion, he needed to have three orgasms a day,” she said. “It was biological, like eating.”
Rinaldo Rizzo, former house manager for Epstein’s friends Glenn and Eva Dubin, testified Maxwell instructed a group of 11 girls, some as young as 14, to play a “kissing game” with Epstein. Rizzo also alleged Maxwell confiscated the passport of a “terrified 15-year-old” to make her have sex with Epstein on his island.
BUT ALSO NOT AS DAMNING AS EXPECTED
Beyond bombshell headlines around Bill Clinton and Prince Andrew, there was little detail of the other high-profile names which appeared in the Epstein documents.
King of Pop Michael Jackson was at Epstein’s home but no claims were made. Magician David Copperfield performed “some magic tricks” at dinner and curiously asked if “girls were getting paid to find other girls”. No more mention was made.
One of the witnesses said they had never met Kevin Spacey, who was on the infamous 2002 trip to Africa in which Clinton was pictured getting a massage from Chauntae Davies, who worked as a flight attendant on Epstein’s private jet.
Many of the names were likewise included in the negative as a response to whether witnesses had met them. Israel Prime Minister Ehud Barak? No. US Vice President Al Gore? No. New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson? No. Victoria’s Secret billionaire Les Wexner? No. Hyatt heir Tom Pritzker? No.
THE PEOPLE IN EPSTEIN’S ORBIT
Being mentioned in the course of a deposition doesn’t imply wrongdoing, and the documents were originally sealed because a judge determined that they weren’t martial to the matter.
The number of those mentions, meanwhile, paints a picture of who came in and out of Epstein’s orbit with the most or least frequency. Of the 150 named in the 943 pages, including footnotes and legal references, here are some of the most.
Ghislaine Maxwell, with 208 mentions, unsurprisingly appears the most as being the defendant in the defamation case brought by Virginia Giuffre.
Alan Dershowitz, with 137, mentions, was both Epstein’s defence lawyer and accused in sworn testimony as one of the “powerful individuals” who had sexual relations with a young woman “on numerous occasions”. However, Giuffre withdrew an accusation she had made against Dershowitz, saying she “may have made a mistake “ in identifying him as an abuser
Bill Clinton, with 73 mentions, is by far the highest profile person named the most times on the list. The former US President, previously listed as “John Doe 36”, has acknowledged a previous association with Epstein. A spokesperson for Clinton told CNN he knew nothing of the “terrible crimes”.
Prince Andrew has 67 mentions under his full royal title, and has many more referenced simply as “Andrew” in informal correspondence, including from Maxwell.
ONE OF THESE PRESIDENTS IS NOT LIKE THE OTHER
Much has been made of the two US presidents named in the documents, but one of those is not like the other.
Donald Trump was the highest profile figure named to have been mentioned the fewest times. The four instances of his inclusion in the almost 1000 pages came in an anecdote about Epstein’s jet being diverted to Atlantic City in 2001.
“Jeffrey said, ‘Great, we’ll call up Trump and we’ll go to’ – I don’t recall the name of the casino, but – ‘we’ll go to the casino’,” Sjoberg testified. It was unstated whether the visit to the casino occurred, and Sjoberg added that she never gave a massage to Trump.
By contrast, Sjoberg said that Epstein told her “Clinton likes them young, referring to girls”. Flight logs of Epstein’s private plane, dubbed the “Lolita Express”, show that the former US president took at least nine trips on the jet to places including Paris, Bangkok and Brunei.
Maxwell, however, denied ever hosting him on Epstein’s private Caribbean island.
WHEREABOUTS OF THAT PICTURE REMAINS UNKNOWN
Sweaty pits and all. The infamous 2001 picture of Prince Andrew with accuser Virginia Giuffre at Maxwell’s London townhouse remains a key piece of evidence.
The Duke of York, who maintains his innocence, says the picture can’t exist because a war injury meant he couldn’t sweat. And the picture showed sweaty pits.
Asked where the original of the “widely circulated” image remains, Ms Giuffre said its precise location had not been identified at the time of the deposition.
“I probably still have it. It’s not in my possession right now,” she said, adding that the original was returned to her by the FBI in 2011.
When asked where it was, she said “probably in some storage boxes” at her nephew’s house in Sydney after being shipped to Australia from Colorado.
“If I can’t 100 per cent say that the photograph is there, it could be at my house that I presently live in,” she said.
“I mean, there’s seven boxes full of Nerf guns, my kids’ toys, photos. I don’t know what other documents would be in there.”
GHISLAINE MAXWELL MAINTAINS HER INNOCENCE
Ghislaine Maxwell broke her silence on the explosive unsealing of US court documents that revealed chilling claims by victims of accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
The disgraced socialite madame issued a statement through her lawyers saying she “took no position on the Court’s recent decision to unseal documents in Giuffre v. Maxwell”.
“As these disclosures have no bearing on her or her pending appeal,” said the statement from lawyers Arthur L. Aidala and Diana Fabi Samson.
“Ghislaine’s focus is on the upcoming appellate argument asking for her entire case to be dismissed.
“She is confident that she will obtain justice in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
“She has consistently and vehemently maintained her innocence.”
RICKY GERVAIS CALLED IT
A clip of comedian Ricky Gervais roasting Hollywood actors for their connections to Epstein went viral following the release of the documents.
Three years after first going viral in 2020, the infamous Golden Globes monologue would be his last hosting the ceremony after he claimed, giving a spoiler alert for his Netflix series, that his character “didn’t kill himself … “just like Jeffrey Epstein”.
“Shut up, I know he’s your friend but I don’t care,” he said, as the camera panned to uncomfortable faces in the Hollywood audience.
The first release of documents included celebrities like Leonardo DiCaprio, Bruce Willis, Cameron Diaz, Kevin Spacey, George Lucas, Naomi Campbell, David Copperfield, Michael Jackson and Cate Blanchett.
Speaking of Cate Blanchett.
EPSTEIN MADE SPECIAL MENTION OF CATE BLANCHETT
Jeffery Epstein would “get off” while claiming to be talking to Australian star Cate Blanchett, according to testimony contained in court documents.
The Oscar-winning actor was named in the first batch of Epstein files, with witness Johanna Sjoberg saying in a deposition that the disgraced pedophile “name-dropped” Hollywood stars like Leonardo de Caprio and Bruce Willis.
Ms Sjoberg said she never met Ms Blanchett when asked about a press report of a meeting, and there is no suggestion of wrongdoing.
“When I spoke about them, it was when I was massaging him (Epstein), and he would get off,” Ms Sjoberg said in the 2016 deposition.
“He would be on the phone a lot at that time, and one time he said, ‘Oh, that was Leonardo, or that was Cate Blanchett, or Bruce Willis. That kind of thing.”
Blanchett’s Australian management agency RGM Artists has not publicly commented.
EPSTEIN BROKE THE INTERNET
The release of the Epstein files crashed the website hosting them within minutes, showing interest in the billionaire’s alleged pedophile ring is no longer relegated to the shady corners of the conspiracy theory internet.
The CourtListener site, run by the non-profit Free Law Project, quickly crashed with the message: “This usually happens when we are doing maintenance or our server is overloaded.”
In her first public comment on the document release, Giuffre said: “WE BROKE THE WEBSITE”.
WE BROKE THE WEBSITE 🙈🙉🙊 pic.twitter.com/MGnWAdmUq0
— Virginia Giuffre (@VRSVirginia) January 4, 2024
TWO FIGHTING RELEASE OF NAMES
At least two individuals have objected to the disclosure of their identities in the case.
According to court records, documents for J Doe 107 and J Doe 110 will not be immediately released.
Lawyers for “Doe 107” argued before the judge that they could face victimisation in the home country. They requested an extension to submit grounds for the identity to remain sealed.
“As Doe 107 has previously stated, she lives in a culturally conservative country and lives in fear of her name being released,’ wrote lawyer Richard Levitt.
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