Jeffrey Epstein was a financier and financial broker educator from New York, but that’s not what he’s known for. Epstein was born on January 20th, 1963, and would go on to have the most infamous case involving child sex trafficking involving a list of celebrities, many of which are still being revealed.
Epstein was first investigated in March 2005 after a 14-year-old girl’s family reported he molested her at his mansion on the infamous Epstein Island. Years later, more underage girls, many around high school ages, would come forward stating that Epstein would make them give him a massage. In the following year, Epstein was charged with multiple accounts of unlawful sex with a minor and later arrested after a grand jury indicted him on one count of soliciting a prostitute—the lack of indictment from the jury for the charges that include minors raised the media’s attention. Many people had issues with this and believed there was some special attention, which made the F.B.I. begin their investigation.
In June 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty to one count of soliciting prostitution and only one count of soliciting prostitution of someone who is under 18. Epstein was sentenced to 18 months in jail and served most of his sentence with a work-release program that allowed him to leave during the day to work and then return to the prison at night.
After he was released from jail, multiple victims of Epstein would continue to come out and attempt to overturn his federal non-prosecution agreement. One woman who came forward, Virginia Giuffre, stated that Epstein and his girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, would set up “meetings” with powerful and wealthy men for her and other girls. One of these powerful men revealed was Prince Andrew, and Giuffre stated she was forced to have sexual relations with him on multiple occasions.
Almost ten years later, the Miami Herald, a Florida-based newspaper, revisited the handling of Epstein’s case. The journalist, Julie K. Brown, recalled researching sex trafficking in the state of Florida, and all the articles she got were on Epstein. The article itself mainly focused on Alexander Acosta, the U.S. Attorney at the time of Epstein’s case, who agreed not to file a federal case against Epstein, who, despite this, had identified multiple underage victims. This article’s coverage of Epstein and Acosta’s deal sparked public interest in this case, which started a new investigation. Finally, on July 6th, 2019, Epstein was arrested for federal sex trafficking charges in New York after prosecutors concluded they weren’t bound to his previous agreements. A few weeks later, on August 10th, jail guards found Epstein dead in his cell, being ruled a suicide. However, Epstein’s death would become controversial as many believe that Epstein’s death wasn’t suicide but rather something else like someone killed him. The following year, Epstein’s girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, would be charged with recruiting underage girls that Epstein would abuse. Maxwell herself sometimes participated in abusing underage girls. In December 2021, Maxwell was convicted of multiple charges; in June 2022, she was sentenced to 20 years in prison.
This brings us to Wednesday, January 3rd, 2024 when Jeffrey Epstein’s acquaintances were released as part of the court documents. The U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska ordered the documents to be released and gave until January 1st to appeal in case people didn’t want their names revealed. However, the victims who were minors at the time had their names redacted, but many of them have revealed themselves previously to speak out against Epstein.
However, many celebrities listed, like Bruce Willis, Leonardo DiCaprio, Cameron Diaz, Naomi Campbell, Kevin Spacey, and Cate Blanchett, have not been accused of helping Epstein in any way. Johana Sjoberg, a victim of Epstein, even stated she had never met any of those people but rather saw many politicians and figureheads. Other high-profile people mentioned included Bill Clinton, Donald Trump, Michael Jackson, Jean-Luc Brunel, Bill Richardson, Leslie Wexner, Alan Dershowitz, and Marvin Minsky.
Dershowitz and Minsky are professors at highly prestigious schools, Harvard University, and M.I.T., but they have denied the allegation. Many of those who have been accused have denied all the allegations, even going on to say they had cut off contact with Epstein in the late 2000s. Both Virginia Giuffre and Johana Sjoberg have recalled details of their abuse involving the people above despite them being denied.
