Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton, Michael Jackson, and Stephen Hawking are just a few of the hundreds of names unveiled in the enormous documents that have just been unsealed from a lawsuit connected to sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
With the documents having been made public on Wednesday (January 3), the world woke up on Thursday to a disturbing list of A-list celebrities named in the first set of documents to be unsealed under a December 18 court order, with an awaited number of more notable names to be exposed in the coming weeks.
Highlights
- Documents name Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton, Michael Jackson, and Stephen Hawking in Epstein case.
- Epstein documents reveal encounters with famous figures but no evidence of wrongdoing.
- Johanna Sjoberg claims Prince Andrew groped her, but Buckingham Palace denies allegations.
- Clinton flew on Epstein's plane but denies knowing of his 'terrible crimes'.
The documents in total, including additional material yet to be unsealed, are expected to include nearly 200 names, including some of Epstein’s accusers, prominent businesspeople, politicians, and potentially more, CNN reported.
Jeffrey Epstein's lawsuit documents were just unsealed, naming Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton, Michael Jackson, Stephen Hawking, and more notable figures
Image credits: Rex Features/Shutterstock
The documents contain excerpts of depositions taken of convicted sex trafficker partner Ghislaine Maxwell and alleged victim Virginia Roberts Giuffre. Additionally, it also reportedly contains a deposition from Johanna Sjoberg, who in the document described Prince Andrew touching her breast in a joking manner while taking photos.
Despite Sjoberg’s story already being public, the unsealed documents now reveal, for the first time, her deposition detailing how she sometimes worked for Epstein. Sjoberg, who was a 20-year-old student at the time of the alleged crimes, claimed that the late sex offender pressured her to go beyond her comfort level at times in giving sexualized massages.
The newly made public deposition transcripts reportedly include references to several prominent names, as has been previously reported, including Prince Andrew as well as former US president Bill Clinton.
Sjoberg recalled in her 2016 deposition that Epstein had spoken to her about Clinton. She said: “He said one time that Bill likes them young, referring to girls.” When asked if Clinton was a friend of Epstein’s, she said she understood Epstein had “dealings” with the former president, as per CNN.
A spokesperson for Bill Clinton confirmed that he had flown on Epstein’s private plane but said the former president knew nothing of the financier’s “terrible crimes”
Image credits: The Mega Agency
A spokesperson for Clinton confirmed in 2019 that the former president had flown on Epstein’s private plane but said the former president knew nothing of the financier’s “terrible crimes.”
On Wednesday, A spokesperson for Clinton reiterated that 2019 denial and told CNN that it has now “been nearly 20 years since President Clinton last had contact with Epstein.” Clinton has not been accused of any crimes or wrongdoing related to Epstein.
In her deposition, Sjoberg reportedly recalled a time she was with Epstein on one of his planes and pilots informed them they needed to land in Atlantic City. The sex offender then suggested they contact former US President, Donald Trump.
Image credits: US District Court for the Southern District New York
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.” She later said in her deposition she never gave a message to Trump. The US presidential candidate has not been accused of wrongdoing related to Epstein in the documents.
Sjoberg further claimed that the late musician Michael Jackson was at Jeffrey’s Palm Beach mansion and that she met the famed magician David Copperfield, The Guardian reported.
“Did you ever meet anybody famous when you were with Jeffrey?” she was asked, to which she said: “I met Michael Jackson … at [Epstein’s] house in Palm Beach.” Asked whether she massaged the late King of Pop, Sjoberg replied: “I did not.”
As for the legendary magician, Sjoberg said that he attended dinner at one of Epstein’s homes and “he did some magic tricks”.
Virginia Giuffre sued Prince Andrew, accusing him of "sexual assault and intentional infliction of emotional distress"
Image credits: ddp/Vida Press
“Did you observe David Copperfield to be a friend of Jeffrey Epstein’s?” she was asked. Sjoberg replied in the affirmative.
“Did Copperfield ever discuss Jeffrey’s involvement with young girls with you?” she was also asked. “He questioned me if I was aware that girls were getting paid to find other girls.”
Copperfield, she said in the deposition, didn’t tell her any specifics of that question. “Did he say whether they were teenagers or anything along those lines?” she was also asked. “He did not.”
Image credits: US District Court for the Southern District New York
The unsealed documents further suggested that Epstein hoped that his association with famed physicist Stephen Hawking would him help battle child sex trafficking allegations.
In a typo-riddled email made public on Wednesday night, Epstein told Ghislaine to try to pay off people close to accuser Virginia Roberts Giuffre.
"You can issue a reward to any of virginias friends acquaionts family that come forward and prove her allegations are false," he wrote on Jan. 12, 2015, as per The Messenger.
While awaiting trial in 2019, Epstein reportedly suggested the late physicist didn’t partake in some sort of questionable activity involving minors. He wrote: "And the new version in the virgin islands that stven hawking partica-ted in an underage orgy."
Alleged victim, Johanna Sjoberg, claimed that Michael Jackson was at Epstein’s Palm Beach mansion, but didn't commit sex crimes
Image credits: Wikimedia Commons
The documents subsequently do not mention any wrongdoing by Hawking.
In August 2021, Virginia Giuffre sued Prince Andrew in the federal District Court for the Southern District of New York, accusing him of "sexual assault and intentional infliction of emotional distress."
The lawsuit was filed under New York's Child Victims Act, legislation extending the statute of limitations where the plaintiff had been under 18 at the time, 17 in Giuffre's case, The Guardian reported.
On 29 October 2021, Prince Andrew's lawyers filed a response, stating that their client "unequivocally denied Virginia's false allegations".
In February 2022, the case was settled out of court, with Prince Andrew making a donation to the plaintiff's charity for victims of abuse, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.
In the now public documents, Sjoberg claimed Prince Andrew groped her in 2001 while she was visiting Ghislaine's London home.
"At one point, Ghislaine told me to come upstairs, and we went into a closet and pulled out the puppet, the caricature of Prince Andrew, and brought it down. And there was a little tag on the puppet that said 'Prince Andrew' on it," she said in her 2016 deposition, as per ABC News.
Image credits: US District Court for the Southern District New York
"They decided to take a picture with it, in which Virginia and Andrew sat on a couch. They put the puppet on Virginia's lap, and I sat on Andrew's lap, and they put the puppet's hand on Virginia's breast, and Andrew put his hand on my breast, and they took a photo."
Buckingham Palace has previously said Giuffre's allegations were "categorically untrue", and the existence of the puppet photo has never been proven.
From 1994 to 2004, Ghislaine and Jeffrey worked together to select underage girls, groom them, and then lure them to travel and transport them to the financier’s properties in New York, Florida, New Mexico, and elsewhere, prosecutors said.
Epstein hoped that his association with famed physicist Stephen Hawking would help him battle child sex trafficking allegations
Image credits: NASA/Paul E. Alers
The girls, some of whom were as young as 14 years old, were then sexually abused, often under the guise of a “massage,” they said.
Victims have also exposed the billionaire’s private island of Little St. James in the US Virgin Islands as a center of an international sex trafficking ring.
While Epstein was arrested in July 2019 on federal charges for the sex trafficking of minors in Florida and New York, before dying in his jail cell on August 10, 2019, Ghislaine is still living and breathing, in prison.
In 2021, the former British socialite was found guilty of child sex trafficking and other offenses in connection with Epstein and was finally sentenced in a New York court in 2022 to twenty years’ imprisonment.
Maxwell is currently facing a second criminal trial for two charges of lying under oath about Epstein’s abuse of underage girls.
Other Hollywood names mentioned in the unsealed court files include Leonardo DiCaprio, Bruce Willis, and Cate Blanchett.
One witness claimed that Epstein "would be on the phone a lot at that time" and on one occasion he said "Oh, that was Leonardo, or that was Cate Blanchett or Bruce Willis".
Cameron Diaz and Kevin Spacey were also among the high-profile figures from the entertainment industry named in the court documents.
There is no suggestion that the mentioned celebrities either knew about his crimes or were involved in any criminal behavior. The witness stated that they'd never even met DiCaprio.
Readers were stunned to learn about some of the "top names" exposed in the unsealed documents
