’No relation’: Kochie hits back at false Epstein claim
Former Sunrise host David Koch has taken to social media to slam false claims that his name appeared on the Epstein documents.
Australian TV presenter David ‘Kochie’ Koch has taken to social media to deny false claims that his name features in the newly-released Epstein files.
One of the 170 names in the files is that of Mr. David Koch, an American billionaire who died in 2019.
Trolls have since taken to social media to falsely insinuate that Kochie – who has never associated with Epstein – was the person referred to on the list.
In light of this, the 67-year-old took to X, formely Twitter, to immediately distance himself from the unfounded allegation and blasted the post as “an outrageously false accusation”.
“Just for absolute clarity the David Koch named in the Jeffrey Epstein lists released by the US courts is the American oil billionaire of the same name and no relation,” he wrote.
🙄 it’s the American oil billionaire of the same name, not me. A fact that is pretty easy to research with very little effort before making such an outrageously false accusation
— David Koch (@kochie_online) January 3, 2024
In response to one false allegation from an X user, Kochie issued a strongly-worded reply to clear his name.
“It’s the American oil billionaire of the same name, not me. A fact that is pretty easy to research with very little effort before making such an outrageously false accusation.”
Major figures like former President Bill Clinton, magician David Copperfield, French hairstylist entrepreneur Frédéric Fekkai and Prince Andrew were named on the list.
Other names include Steve Forbes, editor in chief of Forbes magazine, media mogul Rupert Murdoch, and supermodel Naomi Campbell.
Those people named are not accused of any wrongdoing.
Just for absolute clarity the David Koch named in the Jeffrey Epstein lists released by the US courts is the American oil billionaire of the same name and no relation
— David Koch (@kochie_online) January 4, 2024
Bombshell David Copperfield claim in Epstein documents
A bombshell new claim about American magician David Copperfield has come to light in fresh Jeffrey Epstein court documents.
Johanna Sjoberg – one of Epstein’s alleged victims who claimed Prince Andrew groped her – testified that Copperfield asked if she knew Epstein’s “girls” were encouraged to procure other girls for him.
The documents show that Sjoberg said during her deposition that the world-renowned magician was having dinner at Epstein’s home when he asked her if she had released others were being paid to procure new girls.
“David Copperfield was at a dinner at Epstein’s and there was another girl present who looked young and Johanna asked what school she went to and Johanna did not recognise the school name as being a college and she said it was possible it was a high school aged girl” the document stated.
“Johanna said Copperfield ‘questioned me if I was aware that girls were getting paid to find other girls’”.
Sjoberg confirmed in her deposition on May 18, 2016, that she met Copperfield during a dinner at Epstein’s house, although she did not reveal when or where the meeting took place.
“Someone called me from the house and said that he would be there, and if I wanted to come have dinner, then I could meet him,’ she said.
She said the magician was not yet at the house when she arrived, so she waited with another girl she had not met who “seemed very young”.
“I asked her what school she went to, kind of prodding to see if she went to one of the area colleges, and I did not recognise the name of the school,” she said.
“So I thought she could be younger than college age, but I had to assume for my own sanity that she was a daughter of one of his friends.”
Sjoberg said Copperfield did some magic tricks during dinner and she observed him to be a friend of Epstein.
That same night, the magician discussed Epstein’s involvement with young girls with Sjoberg, according to her deposition.
“He questioned me if I was aware that girls were getting paid to find other girls,” she said.
A 946-page trove of court document from Virginia Roberts Giuffre’s 2015 lawsuit against Ghislaine Maxwell were unsealed on Thursday morning Australia time.
Elsewhere in the deposition, she said Copperfield didn’t go into specifics on the question. “Did he say whether they were teenagers or anything along those lines?” she was asked.
To which she replied: “He did not.”
Maxwell is currently serving a 20 year prison sentence for sex trafficking and was the only person ever punished for the Epstein sex trafficking ring.
Epstein said Bill Clinton “likes them young”
Jeffrey Epstein once said that former President Bill Clinton “likes them young,” a victim of the dead sex offender testified in a deposition unsealed Wednesday – part of a trove of long-sealed court documents that began to be made public.
The files, which name more than 170 Epstein associates — such as Clinton, former President Donald Trump and Prince Andrew — were ordered to be released by Manhattan federal Judge Loretta Preska last month.
They were filed in a since-settled defamation lawsuit that Epstein accuser Virginia Roberts Giuffre brought against the late predator’s madam, Ghislaine Maxwell, in 2015.
Another Epstein victim, Johanna Sjoberg, said in a 2016 deposition that the Duke of York put his hand on her breast as she sat on his lap at the financier’s Manhattan townhouse in 2001.
She also posed for a photo alongside Giuffre, whose breast was groped using a puppet of Andrew, Sjoberg testified.
“They put the puppet on Virginia’s lap, and I sat on Andrew’s lap, and they put the puppet’s hand on Virginia’s breast, and Andrew put his hand on my breast, and they took a photo,” she said of Maxwell and Epstein.
According to Reuters, Andrew has denied the accusation, which was revealed and reported on in a previous document dump.
Sjoberg was also asked about Epstein’s comments on Clinton in the same deposition.
“[Epstein] said one time that Clinton likes them young, referring to girls,” she testified.
You can view and download the Epstein court documents here
Former President Clinton said regarding sex trafficking charges against Epstein, he knew nothing about the financier’s “terrible crimes”.
“President Clinton knows nothing about the terrible crimes Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to in Florida some years ago, or those with which he has been recently charged in New York,” the statement from a Clinton spokesperson read.
Trump’s name also came up in Sjoberg’s testimony — with Epstein once suggesting a stop at one of the real estate mogul’s casinos in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
Epstein’s private jet pilots informed the group that they were forced to reroute from New York City and Epstein said: “Great, we’ll call up Trump and we’ll go to … the casino,” Sjoberg said.
Also included in the huge document dump is an email from Epstein to Maxwell denying claims Stephen Hawking participated in an alleged orgy with minors at his Caribbean island.
Hawking, the renowned physicist who passed away in March 2018 at 76, attended a barbecue in 2006 on the island as a guest for a conference sponsored by Epstein.
In an email sent on January 12, 2015, Epstein wrote to Maxwell in a bid to clear the famed professor’s name.
“You can issue a reward to any of Virginia’s friends, acquaints, family that come forward and help prove her allegations are false,” he wrote.
“The strongest is the Clinton dinner, and the new version in the Virgin Islands that Stephen Hawking participated in an underage orgy.”
The unmasked associates, ex-employees and victims — previously only referred to in court papers linked to the suit as “Jane Does” or “John Does” — had been given until January 1 to appeal the judge’s order.
Preska noted in her ruling unsealing the documents that some of the names had already been made public in media interviews over the years and that some had not objected to their identities being disclosed.
In the days leading up to the unsealing, it was reported that Clinton was referred to more than 50 times in the redacted documents as “John Doe 36.”
Many of the references to Clinton, which were not expected to implicate him in any illegal activity, were believed to stem from Giuffre’s early attempts to compel the ex-president to testify against Epstein and Maxwell, reports said.
The former commander-in-chief, who was photographed with Epstein and flew on his private jet on numerous occasions, has long denied having any nefarious connections with the convicted sex offender.
Ghislaine’s emails included in document dump
The unsealed documents include an email sent by Ghislaine Maxwell.
In the email, Maxwell writes: “I can’t even see what life after press hell even looks like.
“Statements that don’t address all just lead to more questions. What is my relationship to Clinton? Andrew? On and on.”
During her deposition, Maxwell stated that Prince Andrew had only visited Epstein’s island once.
She clarified that only female staff were present during the prince’s visit, and no girls were in attendance.
In another round of her deposition, Maxwell also denied that Bill Clinton ever visited Epstein’s island, but she said Clinton did have a meal on Epstein’s plane – and that she knew the former US President’s longtime personal aide Doug Band, who claims Clinton visited the island.
Asked if she had a relationship with Band, Maxwell said: “We are talking about adult consensual relationships, it’s off the record.”
Bill Gates, former Israeli PM expected to be named
Names of Epstein and Maxwell’s victims, associates and alleged co-conspirators will continue to be made public as part of the document dump, according to Preska’s order.
The list is expected to include people with close ties to Epstein, such as Microsoft founder Bill Gates and former Israeli PM Ehud Barak.
There is no suggestion that those named are accused of wrongdoing.
The new files will include emails, legal documents, depositions and more relating to Epstein and Maxwell.
Only Epstein and Maxwell have been charged over the alleged sexual abuse of dozens of young girls in his Upper East Side townhouse and his waterfront mansion in Palm Beach, Florida, between 2002 and 2005.
Ms Giuffre filed a defamation lawsuit in 2015 which was settled – but some of those involved in the trial were identified in the ruling through links to interviews they had previously given.
Judge Preska cited this as a reason for why their identities should not remain sealed.
She ruled there was no legal justification for continuing to conceal the names of more than 150 “John and Jane Does” mentioned in the court filings relating to Epstein.
Media sued to have the documents made public and they have been released on a rolling basis since 2019.
Today’s unsealing is the eighth and likely final release from the 2015 defamation case.
Prince Andrew “tormented”
Meanwhile, according to reports, Prince Andrew was said to be “tormented” over the fact that his name would be dredged back up and linked back to Epstein.
The disgraced royal, who also flew on Epstein’s jet and was once captured in a now-infamous shot with his arm around a then-17-year-old Giuffre, was stripped of his HRH, or “His Royal Highness,” moniker last year by his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth, over his ties to Epstein.
As speculation mounted over the list of names currently being released, Giuffre — long-described as Epstein’s “sex slave” — appeared to taunt associates of the well-connected pedophile.
“There’s going to be a lot of nervous people over Christmas and New Years, 170 to be exact, who’s on the naughty list?” Giuffre tweeted last month.
Giuffre’s defamation suit against Maxwell, which was settled in 2017 for an undisclosed amount, had centred on her claim that Maxwell defamed her by saying that she was lying about being sex-trafficked by Epstein when she was a teenager.
Maxwell was convicted in late 2021 of recruiting and grooming underage girls for Epstein to abuse between 1994 and 2004.
Epstein died by suicide in his Manhattan jail cell in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.
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