B U S I N E S S
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Edited by
James E. Ellis and
Dimitra KessenidesTime isn’t being kind to Victoria’s Secret. The
lingerie retailer has a problem with the past and a
problem with the future—and that leaves the pres-
ent in a muddle of controversy.
Jeffrey Epstein is supposed to be history at the
company—and at its parent, L Brands Inc., for that
matter—but he’s that skeleton that keeps rattling
around the closet to remind everyone he was once
an all-too-lively part of the business. Epstein had a
two-decade-long reign as close confidant, financial
manager, and right hand to the corporation’s chief
executive officer, Leslie Wexner. He even had the
CEO’s power of attorney at one time.
Although he wasn’t an employee at Victoria’s
Secret, Epstein also influenced the way the lin-
gerie company operated, associating with the
division’s chief marketing officer, Ed Razek. In
2005, for example, Razek was a guest at Epstein’s
Manhattan mansion, welcomed by young women
who said they were working as models for Epstein.
Razek told fellow guest William Mook, head of Mok
Industries LLC in Columbus, Ohio, that Victoria’s
Secret used Epstein models and that his girls were
in “the major league,” according to Mook.
Epstein’s relationship with Wexner and L Brands
officially ended in 2007, a year and a half after thefinancier was charged with several counts of sexual
misconduct in Florida. He pleaded guilty to one
charge and spent just 13 months in prison with
work-release privileges. That penalty was widely
derided as exceedingly lenient and, after sex traf-
ficking charges against Epstein were resurrected in
July, fresh outrage over the 2007 plea deal led to
the resignation of U.S. Labor Secretary Alex Acosta,
who’d been the U.S. attorney in Miami in charge of
the prosecution. Epstein now sits in a Manhattan
jail awaiting trial—and perhaps more revelations of
salacious secrets. On July 23 he was found injured
in his cell and put on suicide watch.
L Brands’ efforts to distance itself from Epstein
may not have been all that clean a break. Epstein at
one point had a $1 million investment in MC2 Model
Management, according to a sworn deposition by a
former company bookkeeper. MC2 is owned by Jean-
Luc Brunel, a Frenchman who’s alleged in a civil law-
suit to have brought girls as young as 12 to the U.S.
for sexual purposes and provided them to Epstein
and other friends. Brunel even visited Epstein when
he was first imprisoned in 2008. Victoria’s Secret
continued to work with MC2-represented models
after Wexner severed ties with Epstein. At least three
MC2 models walked in its 2015 fashion show, andBloomberg Businessweek August 5, 2019It’s a Man’s World
A modeling agency linked to Jeffrey
Epstein is just one of the chain’s worries