- The Observer
2 11.08.19 News
him to sexually exploit,” they said.
Epstein’s alleged victims were appar-
ently lured under the guise of giving
him massages which “would be per-
formed nude or partially nude” and
turn “increasingly sexual in nature,
and would typically include one or
more sex acts”. At this point Clinton
and Trump distanced themselves
from the fi nancier.
Following his arrest, more details
about Epstein’s mysterious life
emerged. He had an Austrian pass-
port with his photo but a name that‘Most remembered
his persistent
attention on the
girls in hallways
and classrooms’
Former high school student
RIGHT
Donald Trump
and his then
girlfriend
Melania Knauss,
Jeffrey Epstein
and Ghislaine
Maxwell at Mar-
a-Lago, Florida,
in 2000. GettyFrom jetsetting
moneyman to a
Manhattan jail:
the life and times
of Jeffrey Epstein
He commanded a fortune and a web of powerful
associates. But he faced many allegations of sex abuse,
and his accusers say his death may now mean they
will never see justice, writes Victoria Bekiempis
When Jeffrey Epstein appeared in
Manhattan’s federal court to face sex
traffi cking charges last month, gone
were the trappings of a high-fly-
ing fi nancier who had once counted
the rich and powerful as his associ-
ates and for whom the whole world
seemed a fantasy playground.
Epstein, whose navy blue jail
clothes and messy hair gave him an
air of fatigued dishevelment, pleaded
not guilty to charges that he had sex-
ually exploited and abused dozens
of underage girls between 2002 and
2005 at his homes in Manhattan and
Palm Beach.
What came next was an unex-
pected twist for a man who for years
had been able to live freely despite the
multitude of sex abuse allegations:
h is money couldn’t help him.
Epstein had offered to put up some
$100m for bail. He requested house
arrest, secured by armed guards he
would pay for. But the judge did not
accept his argument. “The govern-
ment has established danger to oth-
ers and to the community by clear and
convincing evidence,” judge Richard
Berman said. “I doubt that any bail
package can overcome a danger to the
community.”
Yesterday, shortly after the unseal-
ing of a tranche of legal documents
likely to provide lurid new details
about his alleged abuse, Epstein was
found dead in his jail cell.
He had grown up in Brooklyn, New
York. His parents were both children
of immigrants. His father was a park
keeper and his mother was a school
assistant. He attended Cooper Union
and New York University , but failed
to graduate. Somehow Epstein man-
aged to land a teaching job at the
renowned Dalton High School in
New York. It was the mid-1970s. His
fl ashiness raised eyebrows: he appar-
ently wandered the halls “in a fur coat,
gold chains and an open shirt that
exposed his chest,” according to the
New York Times.
Epstein once showed up at a party
where students were drinking alco-
hol, one former student recalled.“Most remembered his persistent
attention on the girls in hallways and
classrooms.”
While Epstein was eventually dis-
missed for “poor performance”, he
used his Dalton connections for work
on Wall Street. He quickly moved up
the ranks of the now-defunct invest-
ment bank Bear Stearns. The rise
of options trading required a deep
understanding of maths.
“For Epstein, breaking down such
models was pure sport, and within
just a few years he had his own stable
of clients,” according to a 2002 New
York magazine profi le. He amassed
enough wealth to hire a limousine
and chauffeur. Epstein opened his
own fi rm in 1982. He would handle
clients whose fortunes totalled $1bn.
Among them was Leslie Wexner , who
founded the Ohio-based Limited
clothing stories. Other high-pro-
fi le men entered Epstein’s circle of
friends. “I’ve known Jeff for 15 years.
Terrifi c guy,” Donald Trump told New
York. “He’s a lot of fun to be with. It
is even said that he likes beautiful
women as much as I do, and many of
them are on the younger side. ”
Former president Bill Clinton trav-
elled with Epstein in the moneyman’s
private plane during a tour of Africa
with actors Kevin Spacey and Chris
Tucker. Epstein was also roman-
tically linked to Ghislaine Maxwell ,
the British socialite and daughter of
media mogul Robert Maxwell.
Allegations about the financier
behaving sexually inappropriately
with underage girls started surfac-
ing in 2005. Accusations involving
some 40 teenage girls were settled in
a plea deal with the then Miami US
attorney Alexander Acosta in 2008.
He pleaded guilty to state prostitu-
tion charges rather than more seri-
ous federal crimes, served 13 months
in jail and was required to register as
a sex offender.
Civil litigation surrounding
these allegations painted Maxwell
as Epstein’s recruiter, a claim she
has denied. One of Epstein’s accus-
ers, Virginia Giuffre , claims that hecoerced her into sexual relations with
Prince Andrew – a claim which the
US judge dismissed and was struck
from the record and which both the
Duke of York and Buckingham Palace
have denied.
Epstein continued his jetset life,
travelling in private planes between
his New York, Florida, New Mexico,
US Virgin Islands and Paris homes.
But last year Julie K Brown’s Miami
Herald exposé once again propelled
the allegations against Epstein into
the public discourse. Less than a year
later, the Manhattan US attorney’s
offi ce indicted Epstein, claiming he
“enticed and recruited, and caused to
be enticed and recruited, minor girls”
to “engage in sex acts with him, after
which he would give the victims hun-
dreds of dollars in cash”.
“In order to maintain and increase
his supply of victims,” prosecutors
alleged, he also paid some to lure
others. “This way Epstein created a
vast network of underage victims forwasn’t his. Authorities found dia-
monds and cash when they searched
his Manhattan home.
A Times report claimed that Epstein
wanted “to seed the human race with
his DNA by impregnating women at
his vast New Mexico ranch”. Epstein
also wanted his head and penis to be
frozen after his death, seemingly due
to his interest in science that aimed
to revive frozen bodies in the future.
While Epstein’s life has come to an
end, his legacy will live on – not so
much through the privileged persona
he worked so hard to cultivate, but
through the suffering of the vulnera-
ble girls he is believed to have abused.
Jennifer Araoz , who accused Epstein
of raping her when she was 15, spoke
for many when she said : “We have to
live with the scars of his actions for
the rest of our lives, while he will never
face the consequences of the crimes
he committed, the pain and trauma
he caused so many people. Epstein is
gone, but justice must still be served.”
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