New batch of Epstein documents released - and Hillary Clinton's name emerges
Fox News correspondent Nate Foy has the latest on the series of bombshell document drops on 'America Reports.'
The latest release of Jeffrey Epstein files on Monday revealed photos that appear to show girls or young women on his private island in 2006 – as well as his longtime madam and accomplice who denied being present during that period.
The judge overseeing the case later ordered the file containing the images to be stricken from the public docket and re-filed without them. The images showed young women or girls at Epstein's island, Maxwell lounging about, Epstein, his friend and fellow suspected sex trafficker Jean-Luc Brunel and at least one of Epstein's accusers.
"The Clerk of the Court is directed to strike docket entry 1332-7 in the above-captioned case because it contains inadvertently disclosed images that should have been redacted," Judge Loretta Presak wrote in a Monday evening order. "Counsel shall re-file the stricken document as soon as is practicable."
The documents were previously sealed or redacted as part of a 2015 lawsuit between Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre and Ghislaine Maxwell, the disgraced financier's longtime girlfriend and madam who is now a convicted sex trafficker.
3RD BATCH INCLUDES ALLEGATIONS SEX TRAFFICKER TROLLED NIGHTCLUBS FOR UNDERAGE GIRLS
Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein smile in this undated photograph. This photo was one of many unearthed during Maxwell’s sex trafficking trial in the Southern District of New York, where she was found guilty and sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2022 for working with Epstein to sexually abuse minors. (U.S. Department of Justice/Mega)
Giuffre's lawyers said the photos "unequivocally" establish Maxwell's presence on Epstein's island during a time where she testified under oath she was "hardly around." The photos were part of a filing about Epstein accuser Sarah Ransome, who was not part of the proceedings but laid out the inner workings of Epstein's "massage network" and testified that the victims referred to Maxwell as "Mamma bear."
"Ms. Ransome’s testimony proves that what little Defendant did say during her deposition was far from the truth," Giuffre's lawyers wrote.
Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein embrace for a photo. This photo was one of many unearthed during Maxwell’s sex trafficking trial in the Southern District of New York, where she was found guilty and sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2022 for working with Epstein to sexually abuse minors. (U.S. Department of Justice/Mega)
Ransome also claimed that all of the girls who were taken to Epstein's private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Little St. James, were provided Victoria's Secret bikinis and nightwear by the host. Some of Ransome's deposition had already been made public in previous unsealed files, but with names redacted.
Maxwell's side claimed the accusers were lying about their allegations against her in the hopes that the lawsuit would provide them a "lottery ticket."
Other filings show lawyers for Alan Dershowitz, an intervenor in the case and former attorney for Epstein, attacked Ransome's credibility. After learning that Rasome's deposition would be unsealed, Dershowitz's lawyers asked the court to disclose a series of her emails that they argued show she "is not credible." In them, she made unsubstantiated claims about former President Bill Clinton and the billionaire Richard Branson.
In statements that were later retracted, she claimed Clinton, Branson and the British Prince Andrew, who settled a separate lawsuit with Giuffre in 2022, were all filmed having sex with her friend by Epstein himself.
"Sex tapes were in fact filmed on each separate occasion by Jeffery (sic)," she claimed.
Photo from 2001 that was included in court files shows Prince Andrew with his arm around the waist of 17-year-old Virginia Giuffre. Ghislaine Maxwell is standing to the right. (U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals)
"The Emails are a necessary antidote to Ms. Ransome’s deposition misstatements because they demonstrate she manifestly lacks credibility," Dershowitz's lawyers wrote. In addition to accusations against Clinton and Branson, the emails described Hillary Clinton as "that evil b----" and hurled more unsubstantiated sexual accusations at former President Donald Trump.
These baseless accusations have been fully retracted because they are simply false and have no merit.
None of them have been accused of wrongdoing in connection with Epstein's crimes.
In one of the emails to a news reporter, however, Ransome said she wanted to retract the allegations and "walk away from this."
"These baseless accusations have been fully retracted because they are simply false and have no merit," Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said Monday.
Jeffrey Epstein pictured in Cambridge, Massachusetts on Sept. 8, 2004. (Rick Friedman/Rick Friedman Photography/Corbis via Getty Images)
A spokesperson for Virgin Group, the holding company Branson founded, pointed to a 2019 New Yorker interview in which Ransome said she "invented" the claims about sex tapes but did not mention the British billionaire by name.
"We can confirm that Sarah Ransome’s claims are baseless and unfounded," the spokesperson said.
In a New Yorker report published in 2019, Ransome admitted that she had ‘invented’ the tapes. We can confirm that Sarah Ransome’s claims are baseless and unfounded.
JEFFREY EPSTEIN NAME-DROPPED STEPHEN HAWKING; PHOTOS SHOW PHYSICIST ON SEX TRAFFICKER'S ISLAND
Maxwell and Giuffre reached a settlement in the case in 2017. The new filings show that afterward, Maxwell's lawyers sought a court order telling Giuffre's side to return confidential documents that had been turned over in the discovery process.
The term "massage" within Epstein's orbit was a code word for sex, according to Ransome, and the many girls he employed as masseuses were trafficking victims.
Virginia Roberts Giuffre holds a photo of herself as a teen, when she says she was abused by Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine Maxwell and Prince Andrew, among others. (Emily Michot/Miami Herald/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
"That’s like a key word for sex," she said, according to a transcript of her deposition. "So as soon as you stop having sex with Jeffrey and his friends and his girls, you’re out, because otherwise there’s no reason for you to be associated with Jeffrey, because you’re just there to have sex with him…"
She also said she witnessed Epstein having sex with the model turned pilot Nadia Marcinkova on his plane in plain view.
Nadia Marcinkova, former alleged accomplice of pedophile Jeffrey Epstein. She has reinvented herself as Nadia Marcinko and become a private pilot. Epstein accuser Sarah Ransome said in a deposition that she and Epstein had sex in plain view on his private plane. (Tim Stewart News)
Ransome, who in 2022 told the New York Post likened to time with Epstein to a "dungeon of sexual hell," claimed Maxwell would bully girls who did not comply with Epstein's sexual demands and that the traffickers broke their promise to pay for her college education at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City.
U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska ordered the documents' unsealing in December but gave each of the John and Jane Does two weeks to appeal. Lawyers for Giuffre posted the first 191 unsealed files last week out of an estimated 240, and another 17 late Monday morning.
Giuffre's lawyers unsealed documents in batches of dozens at a time, beginning Wednesday.
Sarah Ransome, an alleged victim of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, speaks with members of media while arriving at federal court in New York, U.S., on Tuesday, June 28, 2022. Prosecutors last week said Ghislaine Maxwell, the British socialite convicted of sex-trafficking with former boyfriend Jeffrey Epstein, deserves to spend 30-55 years in prison for engaging in the 10-year sex-trafficking scheme while Maxwell's lawyers argue she deserves less than six years. (Victor J. Blue /Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Epstein had many high-profile connections, including former U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, foreign prime ministers and Britain's Prince Andrew, as well as Hollywood stars, leading academics, people in the modeling and fashion industries and other public figures.
Some of the names were previously known through other means despite having been withheld from the public's eye in the lawsuit.
2ND BATCH OF DOCUMENTS UNSEALED IN GHISLAINE MAXWELL LAWSUIT
Many of the names belong to people who have not been accused of wrongdoing, including Clinton and Trump.
Some names will remain sealed for various reasons, including names of some of Epstein's underage victims and at least one person who the judge said had been falsely identified. The judge is also expected to decide on whether to release the identities of two Does in the lawsuit who have requested to remain unnamed.
JEFFREY EPSTEIN LIST: COURT UNSEALS NAMES IN GHISLAINE MAXWELL LAWSUIT
Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein smile in this undated photograph. This photo was one of many unearthed during Maxwell’s sex trafficking trial in the Southern District of New York, where she was found guilty and sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2022 for working with Epstein to sexually abuse minors. (U.S. Department of Justice/Mega)
In a separate criminal case, Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years behind bars for sex trafficking Epstein's victims.
She is appealing that conviction and has declined to comment on the document dump.
Epstein died in federal custody in 2019. A Justice Department investigation accused the U.S. Bureau of Prisons of negligence in allowing him to commit suicide behind bars, depriving "his numerous victims, many of whom were underage girls at the time of the alleged crimes, of their ability to seek justice through the criminal justice process."
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Maxwell has said she believes he was killed.
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