From left: by Tony Avelar/Bloomberg, by Amanda Gordon/Bloomberg, by Gary Gershoff, by Tasos Katopodis. All from Getty Images.
The Jeffrey Epstein
scandal “already seems bigger than Weinstein,” one source involved in
litigation against Epstein told me, referring to the downfall of the
disgraced Hollywood mogul. And the scariest thing to the elite worlds
through which Epstein glided over decades is that it may be closer to
the beginning than the end. According to attorney David Boies, some 2,000 pages of documents regarding his client Virginia Roberts Giuffre,
a former Mar-a-Lago locker-room attendant and Epstein accuser, are set
to be released in the next “10 days to two weeks.” The secrets contained
in the documents have been the subject of fevered speculation ever
since a federal appeals court panel noted that the pages could describe
episodes of alleged abuse by Epstein and appearances by “numerous
prominent American politicians, powerful business executives, foreign
presidents, a well-known prime minister, and other world leaders.”
The sealed documents are part of the evidence submitted in a 2015 lawsuit brought by Giuffre against Epstein’s alleged madam, Ghislaine Maxwell,
for defamation after she called Giuffre a liar. According to three
sources who have been briefed on the documents’ contents, the documents
contain excerpts of Giuffre’s sworn depositions, in which she names
powerful men in the worlds of politics and science whom she claims she
witnessed hanging around during her years as Epstein’s self-described
“sex slave.” “Some of the documents will identify people she had sex
with. Others will identify people she saw at various Epstein places,”
Boies said.
Why the UK is losing its costly battle against money laundering
Poor tech implementation and bad communication means mafiosi and oligarchs use London as a money laundering haven
Why do the world’s criminals come to London to launder their dirty money?
“It’s
a great place for people to settle. You’ve got people who want stable
investments in real estate, and want to bring their families and
children to a more stable regime. You’ve messed up Russia, right? So
where do you want your kids to grow up? Not Russia,” says Friedrich
Lindenberg of the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project
(OCCRP).
Analysts and academics argue too much of the
money flowing around the UK is the result of crime, corruption and tax
dodging. The House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee has gone further
still, calling on the government to make it a “major UK foreign policy
priority” to stop the use of London as a base for Russian corruption.
And
there’s a lot of work to do. “You can walk into the right office in
London and set up your British Virgin Islands company, your Panama
company, your Guernsey trust,” says Lindenberg. “It’s all handled for
you.”
Jeffrey Epstein, the onetime money manager and a registered sex offender, was arrested on sex trafficking charges
on Saturday. As news of the arrest ricocheted across the media
landscape, many outlets referred to Epstein—mistakenly—as a
billionaire.
“Billionaire Jeffrey Epstein Due In Court To Face
Sex Charges,” read a CNN chyron. “Jeffrey Epstein, Billionaire ...read more at Forbes.com
Jeffrey Epstein, the onetime money manager and a registered sex offender, was arrested on sex trafficking charges
on Saturday. As news of the arrest ricocheted across the media
landscape, many outlets referred to Epstein—mistakenly—as a
billionaire.
“Billionaire Jeffrey Epstein Due In Court To Face
Sex Charges,” read a CNN chyron. “Jeffrey Epstein, Billionaire Long
Accused of Molesting Minors, Is Charged,” said the New York Times. Forbes has
never included Epstein, 66, in its rankings of the World’s
Billionaires, since there is scant proof he holds a ten-figure fortune.
As we wrote in 2010,
“The source of his wealth—a money management firm in the U.S. Virgin
Islands—generates no public records, nor has his client list ever been
released.”
