Jeffrey Epstein in Cambridge, MA in 1984.
Rick Friedman | Corbis News | Getty Images
Two more women who claim financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abused them have filed a $100 million lawsuit against his estate and his “recruiter.”
The lawsuit, filed Thursday night in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, claims the unidentified recruiter lured the two into Epstein’s mansion on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, where he would “sexually touch them against their will and force them to watch him masturbate.”
Epstein, a former friend of Presidents Bill Clinton and Donald Trump, died in an apparent suicide over the weekend in a Manhattan jail cell, where he was facing federal charges of sex trafficking minors and sex trafficking conspiracy.
The 66-year-old money manager, who had registered as a sex offender a decade earlier in a case on related charges, faced up to 45 years in prison.
“Though Epstein is recently deceased, the trauma and pain he caused Plaintiffs remains,” the new lawsuit says. the two women are unidentified in the filing; they are referred to as Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 2. Their age at the time of the alleged incidents was not immediately clear from the filing.
Their lawyer, Lisa Bloom, said on Twitter that “We are talking to five other victims currently and vetting their claims.”
“We demand that Epstein’s estate to do right by all the girls and women he abused,” Bloom added.
The recruiter’s identity is unknown to the plaintiffs, but believed to have been an employee of Epstein’s, according to the lawsuit. She is labeled “Sue Roe” in the filing.
Other unnamed defendants, dubbed “Roes 2-10,” are included in the complaint.
It claims that the two plaintiffs, both aspiring models, were working in a Manhattan restaurant around 2004 when they were approached by a woman who offered hundreds of dollars to massage Epstein at his mansion.
“Both women were struggling financially,” the complaint says, so they “reasonably believed that the opportunity to make money by giving massages would and could provide much-needed financial support.”
During one plaintiff’s massage, Epstein “became increasingly more aggressive, made sexual advances, and masturbated” before he “forcefully and without warning, grabbed Jane Doe 1’s breasts and vagina and then masturbated to completion.”
The recruiter allegedly offered the plaintiff a job to “scout other women for money,” which was refused.
The two women claim they “suffered psychological trauma affecting several areas of their lives” and “must relive their sexual assault everyday due to the inescapable coverage of Epstein’s federal criminal sex-trafficking case.”
The lawsuit’s allegations — including that Epstein and his associates used the term “massage” as a euphemism for the aggressive sexual actions he would later take — are similar to those of other women who claim Epstein abused them.
One alleged victim, Jennifer Araoz, filed a lawsuit on Wednesday claiming Epstein “committed repeated sexual assault and battery upon Ms. Araoz while Ms. Araoz was a 14-15 year old high school student, including forcibly raping Ms. Araoz.”
She is suing Epstein’s estate, as well as Ghislaine Maxwell, his alleged procurer of young girls, and three other former associates of Epstein.
Maxwell, whose whereabouts had been unknown, was reportedly spotted this week at an In-N-Out Burger in Los Angeles.
Federal authorities were angered that Epstein died in prison before being put through the justice system. Attorney General William Barr said he was “appalled” that the Metropolitan Correctional Center could have allowed Epstein to die — just a few weeks after he reportedly was found injured in his cell in a possible suicide attempt.
The feds appear to continue to be investigating his case, however. Epstein had connections to prominent politicians, scientists, investors, executives and even royalty.
Some of Epstein’s accusers have claimed that they were directed to have sex with other powerful people while under Epstein’s influence, as a recent dump of previously sealed court documents shows.
On Monday, FBI agents were seen searching Epstein’s private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Drone footage taken of that raid shows the agents seizing Epstein’s computers.
Read the complaint below:
