Relentless Pursuit

by Bradley J. Edwards

  He went on to tell me that when Epstein was in jail, he still had extraordinary power, even within our own government. This bodyguard had been sent by Epstein to Virginia to CIA headquarters. Nervously telling me the story, he said, “I didn’t know why I was there, but he told me they would take care of me. I attended a class for a week. At the beginning of the class, everyone had to introduce themselves. There were forty-five people. Forty-four people were in the CIA or some other government unit with top secret clearance. I was the only private citizen. Everyone introduced themselves and the instructor saved me for last. He did not let me introduce myself. Instead, he just introduced me as what he called a ‘special operative.’ ” He explained that he then attended the classes for the week before he was given a book with a personalized note and told to deliver it “to Jeffrey.” He took the book to Jeffrey’s seldom-occupied county jail cell and delivered it without reading the contents of the note.

  “Anything else give you any other hints as to who Epstein is?” I asked.

  “I can only tell you where we went and what I observed, but he goes out of his way not to share any real information,” he replied. “He spends most of his days doing what you know he does: hanging out with his girls. Getting massages. The rest is traveling with very specific missions; most don’t last very long. The girls he trusts come along.”

  He told me, for instance, about a prince or a sultan (he didn’t recall which) whom they would meet all over the world. Epstein also often met with Ehud Barak, the former prime minister of Israel. Barak frequently visited Epstein in New York as well, and on extended stays took residence at Epstein’s 301 East Sixty-Sixth Street apartments.

  In fact, not long before my meeting with the bodyguard, Alan Dershowitz had confirmed Epstein’s close relationship with Barak. Dershowitz testified that during his personal, non-privileged conversations with Epstein, he and Jeffrey discussed the Middle East. Dershowitz further described an in-person discussion that he had observed between Barak and Epstein at Epstein’s New York town house wherein the two were drawing up resolutions to Middle East conflict on a blackboard. It was clear that Epstein was exactly as powerful as we always thought he was. But, there was this air of mystery surrounding his connections to international dignitaries like Barak that always begged the question of who Epstein really was.

  Before we split up, there was one more story he shared. On one occasion, after returning to New York just after completing his Florida “jail” sentence, Epstein yelled to this bodyguard that they needed to leave in a hurry. It was clear to him that whatever the reason, it was important and Jeffrey was pissed. Even to his professional bodyguard, when Jeffrey was pissed, he was scary. On that occasion, Jeffrey demanded that the Suburban be brought around quickly. Jojo, the driver, also understood this was an emergency in Jeffrey’s world. Jeffrey didn’t talk during the car ride from the mansion to the Wall Street office of a major league hedge fund manager whom the bodyguard couldn’t (or wouldn’t) identify.

  They got to the office building and Epstein got out of the car with purpose, walking briskly to the front door of the high tower. His bodyguard was trying to keep up.

  They headed to the elevator and Epstein didn’t stop to tell the front desk that he had arrived. When he got up to the floor of the hedge fund, Epstein, still on a mission, walked straight toward the back of the office complex to what his bodyguard referred to as the “president’s” office.

  Epstein opened the door without knocking and barged in. He walked to the chair side of the desk, leaned over to the “president,” and said, “You need to get that money to Israel immediately. Like f***ing yesterday.”

  As the story was relayed to me, the man on the receiving end of Epstein’s demand was shaking. This man was another Wall Street billionaire who made his own rules. With his voice quivering, he responded to Epstein, saying, “I wired thirty million dollars today. It’s already there. You can check.” Without a word to him, Epstein turned around and walked out, leaving the building the same way he’d come in.

  His bodyguard had no idea what that conversation was about, but he knew it was important. He also believed that it epitomized what Jeffrey did for a living, when he was not getting “massages.”

  The point of telling me the story was not just to convey that Epstein was powerful or scary or controlling, even over other powerful and scary people. To me, the point was that no matter what I knew about Epstein, there were many more layers to peel back and not many people who understood what lay at his core.

  Before finishing our meeting, I asked the bodyguard what Epstein did with his days after being released from house arrest in Florida. “Girls. Always girls. I don’t know the ages. I think they are nineteen, twenty, twenty-one. They are mainly models or something. Different girls all the time. Coming from everywhere. He tells them he can make them something. Then they do whatever he tells them to do. I don’t think they are as young as the girls he got in trouble with before, but the damage he’s done to these models is worse than what he did to the girls he went to jail because of in 2008. He controls them, then destroys lives.”

  Before we left, he made it clear that he was scared for my safety. He looked at me across our small round table, giving me a stern final warning: “Jeffrey Epstein is not someone to mess with. You know this, but you keep messing with him. Be careful.”

  “I will,” I assured him before thanking him for meeting.

  I got in my car and tried to scribble as many notes as I could, since I was not able to do so during the meeting. Then I thought about what he had said the whole hour-long ride home.

  Until this meeting, I didn’t really appreciate all that Sarah had been through. Nobody did. She was clearly damaged, and it took tremendous courage for her to come forward to help Virginia. She hadn’t been a minor child when she was with Epstein, but what he had done to her was harmful and wrong. He promised to make her professional dreams come true in order to lure her in, then groomed her into having sex.

  Was what he did to Sarah a crime? While the answer didn’t jump off the page to me, it seemed criminal, especially after listening to his former bodyguard. Was it something Sarah could sue Epstein for? It seemed like the answer should be yes. I went back and looked at the statutes that were listed in the seven-page non-prosecution agreement, as surely Epstein and the government had studied Epstein’s lifestyle to make sure he received immunity for his way of life. Looking through the crimes in the NPA one at a time, I came to 18 USC § 1591—one of the main federal statutes the U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Florida and Epstein’s attorneys listed.

  That statute designated as a crime the recruiting, enticing, transporting, or soliciting of someone by means of fraud, force, or coercion for sex. That is exactly what he had done to Sarah. Epstein had made false promises, which Sarah Ransome reasonably relied on to her detriment—the definition of fraud—in order to cause her to engage in sex. The civil counterpart of section 1591 was in section 1595, which allowed for a civil action for any criminal violation of 1591.

  It was the second week of January 2017 when I was reading through this statute and quickly realized there was a ten-year statute of limitations. Had Sarah’s claim already expired? Not yet. But I realized that it would expire in a few days, and even though she was just a witness whom I did not yet represent, I advised her of this fact. She wanted justice and wanted a complaint filed against everyone involved in the commission of any aspects of these acts immediately.

  So, we filed the lawsuit on her behalf on January 26, 2017, against Epstein for his violation of the sex-trafficking statute; Ghislaine Maxwell for her role, which included instructing Sarah how she must perform various sex acts on Epstein; and Sarah Kellen and Lesley Groff for their role in facilitating the acts, which included carrying out the fraudulent promise to get her into FIT. While not filed on behalf of a child victim, as the others had been, it was another lawsuit filed on behalf of a brave victim that would help uncover other aspects of Je
ffrey Epstein’s abusive world.

  FORTY-THREE “YOU CANNOT BE SERIOUS”

  HAVING FILED SARAH RANSOME’S CIVIL lawsuit, we turned back to Virginia’s case against Ghislaine Maxwell, which was heating up for a trial set to begin on May 15, 2017. Our witnesses were lined up, our exhibits were ready, and we had already booked our hotels in New York for a month, including a large war room at the hotel across the street from the courthouse. The defense strategy had to be to try to exclude as much of the testimony and evidence as possible. They didn’t really have more to hang their hats on.

  There was one last deposition that we were going to take—Maxwell’s, again. Because she refused to answer certain questions during her previous depositions, her next deposition was set to take place in the courtroom with the judge serving as a special master. This deposition was set for the week before the trial, so it goes without saying that we were prepared.

  While the protection of other victims was and always will be our main priority, our witnesses were ready to testify, and the truth about Epstein was finally going to become public. After decades, the justice system was going to expose Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation.

  In the week leading up to Maxwell’s final deposition, hearings had also been scheduled by the court to address last-minute legal issues. Amid the chaos, a final mediation was scheduled so that the parties could take one last shot at a resolution before embarking on what was sure to be an explosive and costly legal battle.

  Without consideration for the mediation, Sigrid and I continued to prepare for trial. We had more than one thousand exhibits to get in order and countless witnesses to line up. It was a massive event to put together, with our team working around the clock to get us ready. In my mind, there was no chance the case was going to settle. As a formality, nonetheless, Virginia arrived in New York early for mediation that was set to take place May 3, 2017. Sigrid and I didn’t have time to be at mediation, so Stan and David went without us.

  To this day, it pains me to think about this next part. I got a surprising late-night call from Stan. It was over. The case had settled on the eve of Maxwell’s deposition, just days away from our arrival at the courthouse steps.

  Because the details of the settlement had not been finalized and we knew by now that anything could happen, Sigrid and I continued to prepare for trial. We boarded our flights to New York for the hearing that was set to take place before Maxwell’s final deposition. By the time we landed, the paperwork was signed, and the remaining obligations were canceled. Rather than turn around and go home, Sigrid and I met David and Stan at Cipriani in New York to discuss the events that had unfolded in the last few days. Sensing what I’m sure was my obvious frustration, David said to me, “I know that this is not the ending you were hoping for, but it’s a great resolution for Virginia.” He wasn’t wrong. Virginia was happy, although she is a fighter and she was a little torn as well. Her perseverance had already caused the Epstein/Maxwell wall to crumble and she didn’t need a trial to continue speaking her truth. She had proven herself. She had already won that round. Big time.

  On the other hand, there was still a feeling of emptiness. I couldn’t bring myself to say more than a few words the whole dinner. I left the restaurant uncertain where to go. I don’t think I spoke a word until I got back to Florida the next morning. There were still unresolved issues for me. Jeffrey Epstein was still free.

  * * *

  The universe must have been sensing my inner turmoil because on June 9, 2017, while I was still sulking about the trial that never happened, the Florida Supreme Court resurrected my personal case against Epstein. This was huge for so many reasons. We had been about to go to trial back in 2013 when that chance was stolen right out from under me by some crazy legal opinion that turned the tables, creating a real risk that Epstein would be a massive creditor of mine with every incentive in the world to destroy me. Rather than bail on the case when I had the chance, as nearly everyone had encouraged me to do, I risked it all hoping that one day the court would rule in my favor and give me a chance to finish what I started. Today was that day.

  We were going back to the trial court with my case against Epstein for the malicious prosecution that he had instituted against me in 2009. At least with my case, I could control the client. I was the client. The difficulty was that I didn’t get to be the lawyer in this case. I did learn that, for me, it was much easier to be the lawyer. However, being the client in two very contentious cases has allowed me to better understand the vantage point of my own clients. It’s not an easy position.

  Between Sarah’s case, and now my personal case, I had legal reason to continue my investigation of Epstein. This helped me get over the fact that he slipped out of the exposure that would have come from the Maxwell trial.

  FORTY-FOUR JULIE

  ON JULY 27, 2017, an investigative reporter for the Miami Herald named Julie Brown reached out to me. Up to that point, more than one hundred reporters had done the same, all asking for information about some aspect of the cases against Jeffrey Epstein. Some had inquired about the criminal investigation, others about the federal process that had resulted in the non-prosecution agreement, but few had dug deep to try to understand the case we had filed for victims under the Crime Victims’ Rights Act.

  There was a fair amount of arcane legal stuff in the CVRA case, which meant most reporters were understandably not interested. Still, the case highlighted a two-tier system of justice that worked differently for the rich than it did for common people. That was something we had now proven and that the public deserved to know.

  Part of the reason for the case’s low profile was probably me. For the most part, I don’t speak much to the media, particularly during litigation. Sometimes it is unavoidable, but my general philosophy is not to do so unless it gives my client an advantage of some kind, such as the likelihood that helpful new witnesses might come forward. There were times, for instance, when we were looking for witnesses that I would speak to reporters and give them enough information that might prompt new witnesses to call our office or law enforcement. But speaking needlessly about an active case to the media just to get a story out there has never interested me.

  When the email came in from Julie Brown, my initial instinct was to ignore it. I knew she was an investigative journalist for the Miami Herald, but it was also evident that she knew nothing about the case. So much had transpired over the past nine years that for her to catch up and write a meaningful and accurate piece—one that wasn’t a regurgitation of previous stories—was, I thought, unlikely. It would also take a lot of my time, which forced me to ask, to what end? What would my clients get out of my taking time to become her source and shape her reporting?

  Before I dismissed her altogether, I read the email out loud in the conference room where my team was preparing another matter for trial. Brittany told me, “You should really think about talking to Julie. I read some of her work on abuse in Florida prisons and it was good. She really investigates before she writes.” Brittany was working on multiple high-profile civil rights cases at the time, so she had paid close attention to those articles.

  I started to rethink ignoring Julie’s email. I looked at her other projects online and it was evident that she was not half-assed in her reporting. Unlike a lot of others, she also appeared to have the patience to cover a story from multiple angles, and not rush to publish too quickly.

  What’s more, there was something bothering me about the case, something that a reporter willing to put in the time could help remedy. From the first cases filed against Epstein, the media had grouped our victims together and treated them as one collective identity whose voices didn’t merit being heard. Even the few girls—now grown women—who had tried to speak were silenced by the bullying lawyers who represented the “misunderstood,” politically connected philanthropist Jeffrey Epstein. Anyone who was identified as one of Epstein’s victims was labeled as nothing more than a prostitute, because the charges that had been conj
ured up by Epstein’s camp, the federal government, and the Palm Beach State Attorney’s Office allowed him to plead guilty for “soliciting prostitution or procuring a minor for prostitution.” Those prior reports lumping the victims together added to their suffering, making them seem like faceless, voiceless, meaningless objects—exactly as Epstein had wanted.

  By this stage of the case, when I’d spoken to more than fifty victims, these characterizations of “the victims” as not having individual identities or being real people bothered me a great deal. I knew the backgrounds of the survivors, and who they were before they’d met Jeffrey Epstein. I had learned a lot about their early lives, what problems they had faced, what vulnerabilities they had displayed, and what had happened to them after they’d been abused and had tried to move on. I had known some for years and considered them friends. They deserved an identity, for the world to understand how brave and strong and special they were.

  Was Julie the reporter who could help me breathe personality into the empty stereotypes that had been given to the public about the Epstein victims? While I was giving as many clients as I could a voice through the legal process, was Julie someone who could understand the facts well enough to help elevate those voices beyond the legal arena? If the answer was yes, was it worth the risk and the enormous amount of time it would take to help Julie catch up? Above all, I wanted to do what was best for my clients, which I knew might mean meeting with Julie.