Yahoo News Who’s on the Epstein list? The key extracts so far
Bill Clinton, Prince Andrew and Donald Trump have been named in unsealed court documents relating to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Here are the key claims so far
What's happening? A new tranche of legal papers relating to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein has been released in the US.
The papers, amounting to 300 pages, are connected to a 2015 defamation case brought by Virginia Giuffre against disgraced British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, who has since been jailed for sex trafficking young girls for Epstein. It comes after an initial 900 pages had been released earlier this week.
A host of high-profile people have been mentioned in the documents. Here, Yahoo News UK sets out some of the public figures who have been named.
Prince Andrew
Prince Andrew quit as a working royal in 2019 over his friendship with Epstein, who was found dead in his cell at a federal jail in New York City that year while he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges. The death was ruled a suicide.
Andrew - who recently appeared alongside the Royal Family on Christmas Day in a rare public appearance - was mentioned more than 70 times in the first tranche of documents.
Evidence from Johanna Sjoberg, who worked for Epstein as a masseuse, appears in the documents and alleges Andrew allegedly touched her breast while sitting on a couch inside Epstein’s Manhattan apartment as he posed for a photo with a caricature of himself in 2001.
Other mentions of the duke include previous allegations that Epstein “forced Jane Doe #3 to have sexual relations with was a member of the British Royal Family, Prince Andrew (a/k/a Duke of York)” at three locations including on Epstein’s private island “in an orgy with numerous other under-aged girls”.
The duke, 63, and Buckingham Palace have previously strenuously denied the allegations.
Read more:
The woman whose testimony dominates the Epstein files (The Telegraph)
Prince Andrew reported to police by anti-monarchy group as court papers renew sex assault claims (The Independent)
Bill Clinton
At the height of his success as a financier, Epstein counted former US president Bill Clinton as part of his social circle.
He has been named in the files, although there is no implication he committed a crime.
In the second tranche of documents released on Thursday, an email exchange with journalist Sharon Churcher in May 2011 showed Virginia Giuffre speak of her concerns about working with Vanity Fair after Clinton had allegedly “threatened them not to write sex-trafficking articles” about Epstein.
Giuffre said Clinton had walked into the magazine's offices and said stories about his "good friend" should not be written. Graydon Carter, a former Vanity Fair editor, has "categorically" denied this.
In the first tranche of filings, there was also testimony from Sjoberg alleging Epstein had told her the former president liked girls “young”. Sjoberg said: “I knew he had dealings with Bill Clinton. I did not know they were friends until I read the Vanity Fair article about them going to Africa together.”
Asked if Epstein had ever talked about the former president, Sjoberg said: “He said one time that Clinton likes them young, referring to girls.” In 2019, Clinton’s spokesman said he knew “nothing about the terrible crimes Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty to” and that the pair had not spoken “in over a decade”.
Read more:
Epstein told victim that Bill Clinton ‘likes them young’, new court filings reveal (The Independent)
Donald Trump
Donald Trump is another former US president who was in Epstein’s social circle. In a 2002 article, he made light of Epstein’s penchant for young girls, telling New York magazine: “I’ve known Jeff for 15 years. Terrific guy. He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side. No doubt about it, Jeffrey enjoys his social life.”
Trump has also been named in the files but again there is no suggestion of wrongdoing.
He was another public figure to feature in Sjoberg’s evidence after she said Epstein had called him and visited one of his casinos due to his private plane being diverted. Sjoberg said: “Jeffrey said, ‘Great, we’ll call up Trump and we’ll go to… I don’t recall the name of the casino, but… we’ll go to the casino.”
Read more:
‘A terrific guy’: What are Donald Trump’s ties to Jeffrey Epstein? (The Independent)
Stephen Hawking
The court documents revealed an email from Epstein to Maxwell, shortly after Virginia Giuffre filed the civil claim in the US in 2015, in which he said he was content for her to “issue a reward” to any of Giuffre’s friends to counter her claims, including that Professor Stephen Hawking participated in an underage orgy.
The email read: “You can issue a reward to any of Virginia’s friends, acquaints, family that come forward and help prove her allegations are false. The strongest is the Clinton dinner, and the new version in the Virgin Islands that Stephen Hawking participated in an underage orgy.”
Renowned physicist Prof Hawking, who died in 2018, is reported to have been a guest at Epstein's private island in the US Virgin Islands in 2016.
Read more:
Michael Jackson
Pop star Michael Jackson was mentioned in Johanna Sjoberg’s interview as someone she had met at Epstein’s house in Florida - but she said their relationship was not sexual and that she didn't give him a massage.
Jackson, who died in 2009, wasn't accused of wrongdoing in the documents.
David Copperfield
Magician David Copperfield was named as an associate of Epstein in the documents and is not accused of wrongdoing.
According to Sjoberg, Copperfield asked her if she was “aware that girls were getting paid to find other girls". She was asked if he questioned whether "they were teenagers or anything along those lines?” Sjoberg said: “He did not.”
She also said he performed magic tricks over dinner at one of Epstein’s properties.
Leonardo DiCaprio, Cameron Diaz and Bruce Willis
Sjoberg suggested in her deposition that Epstein liked to talk about how he knew various A-list movie stars, including Leonardo DiCaprio, Cameron Diaz and Bruce Willis.
When asked about a press report that she had met "Cate Blanchett or Leonardo DiCaprio" in her evidence, Sjoberg denied doing so. However, while she was massaging Epstein, the court heard how the billionaire would "name-drop" stars' names.
Sjoberg said: "He would be on the phone a lot of the time, and one time he said, 'Oh that was Leonardo,' or 'That was Cate Blanchett, or Bruce Willis.' That kind of thing."
Representatives for DiCaprio denied any calls between the actor and Epstein, The Guardian reported while Diaz's team said: "Cameron never met Jeffrey Epstein, nor was she ever in the same place as him or had any association with him whatsoever, regardless of the fact he may or may not have mentioned her name or implied that he knew her."
A representative for Blanchett said she had neither met nor spoke on the phone with Epstein, while representatives for Willis did not immediately respond.
Who are Virginia Giuffre and Joanna Sjoberg?
Giuffre, also known as Virginia Roberts, alleges she was trafficked by Maxwell to be molested by Epstein and his friends.
It is claimed she was trafficked to Prince Andrew, who is alleged to have sexually abused her when she was under the age of 18. Giuffre filed a civil sex assault case against him. It was eventually settled out of court in 2022. Although the parties settled the case, the agreement was not an admission of guilt from the duke and he has always strenuously denied the allegations against him.
Sjoberg is another alleged Epstein victim. In legal documents released in 2019, she said she was a “young college student” who was approached by “perfect stranger” Maxwell, who “lured” her to Epstein’s home with the promise of a “legitimate job”. It was in those legal documents that Sjoberg first said Andrew touched her breast while sitting on a couch inside Epstein’s Manhattan apartment in 2001.
