Practically 4 years earlier than Jeffrey Epstein got here beneath investigation for allegedly luring minor women to his Florida house for illicit massages — a neighborhood police report was opened to analyze claims that Epstein’s affiliate Ghislaine Maxwell was recruiting younger ladies from a close by faculty to reply telephones at Epstein’s home, in keeping with a police report newly disclosed by the Division of Justice.
“They’re paid $200.00 per day for htis [sic] service. It’s unclear what is happening within the residence,” reads the opening entry within the City of Palm Seashore Police Division report, dated Dec. 6, 2001.
The report goes on to element claims that three “feminine faculty college students … had been approached by an English girl who recognized herself as Maxwell.”
FILE – Audrey Strauss, performing U.S. legal professional for the Southern District of New York, factors to a photograph of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, throughout a information convention in New York on July 2, 2020.
John Minchillo/AP
“Maxwell stated she wanted younger, stunning single ladies to reply telephones and do workplace work at her house in Palm Seashore,” reads a Dec. 10, 2001, entry.
The report goes on to say that one of many faculty ladies went to the home on a number of events and described the phone calls as “males name in saying after they had been going to drop off explicit women.”
Three of the faculty “women” — because the report describes them — stated that Maxwell and Epstein “had been secretive about what was occurring on the home,” and that “not less than two of the ladies complained about Epstein touching them inappropriately.”
In addition they associated to the police that Maxwell had requested for an inventory of different women who might work on brief discover and defined that she wanted a “massive pool of ladies” as a result of she didn’t know what number of she would want at any given time.
The doc seems to be the primary public indication of the 2001 investigation.
Its existence represents one other missed alternative to probably halt Epstein’s exploitative conduct a lot sooner.
This undated picture launched by the U.S. Division of Justice exhibits Ghislaine Maxwell.
AP
After receiving the reviews from the faculty college students, officers famous that that they had problem reaching them once more to observe up. They did, nonetheless, proceed their investigation of the reported exercise at Epstein’s home.
They pulled objects from trash bins, which they are saying included listings for massages in New York, and lists of females with ages, descriptions and “what they do.” The investigators additionally researched cellphone and enterprise data for Epstein and Maxwell. They tracked down different college students who stated they’d been approached by Maxwell and who instructed police there was one thing “bizarre” about Epstein and Maxwell, however that they hadn’t seen something unlawful, in keeping with the report.
One other scholar interviewed, in keeping with the report, instructed officers that there have been “ladies operating across the pool space topless, and the folks had been at all times getting massages.”
Finally, the four-page report signifies that the investigation was closed after a dedication that no crimes had occurred.
“Though it seems as if normal [sic] exercise is happening at this residence, presently, no criminal activity has been reported or detected,” reads the report’s remaining entry on April 25, 2002.
Three years later, the household of a 14-year previous woman contacted the City of Palm Seashore police to report that she had been supplied $200 by an older feminine acquaintance to therapeutic massage an older man named “Jeff.” That decision launched three years of investigation by native and federal authorities which ultimately led to Epstein’s controversial non-prosecution settlement with federal prosecutors in 2007.
Epstein served 13 months of an 18-month sentence in a Palm Seashore County Jail.
He was indicted by a grand jury in 2019 on federal expenses of intercourse trafficking and conspiracy earlier than being discovered lifeless by suicide in his jail cell awaiting trial.
Maxwell was charged in 2020 with conspiring to entice minors to journey to have interaction in unlawful intercourse acts, intercourse trafficking of a minor and different offenses. She was convicted in 2021 on 5 of six counts and is serving a 20-year jail sentence in Texas.
