Jeffrey Epstein and his associates allegedly forced some of his victims into sham marriages for immigration purposes, according to a new court filing.
Denise George, the attorney general of the U.S. Virgin Islands, amended her civil enforcement action on Wednesday against Epstein’s estate to include the allegations. The new information gathered by the attorney general’s office shows Darren Indyke and Richard Kahn, the co-executors of Epstein’s estate, being “captains” in his alleged criminal enterprise, and the two of them were listed as defendants in the revised complaint.
George alleges that Epstein and his associates forcibly arranged three separate marriages between noncitizens and three of the dead billionaire’s American victims in an attempt to avoid deportations. She specifically accuses Indyke and Kahn of having “knowingly facilitated the fraudulent and coerced marriages.” The two have denied the allegations.
“The Epstein Enterprise forced at least three separate arranged marriages, in each case requiring American female victims to marry foreign victims to avoid their deportation,” the complaint reads. “The victims were coerced into to [sic] participating in these arranged marriages, and understood that there would be consequences, including serious reputational and bodily harm, if they refused to enter a marriage or attempted to end it.”
In January 2020, George filed the civil suit against Epstein’s estate, but she alleges that they have refused to cooperate with investigators. She said that “newly-obtained evidence” is the impetus for the amended filing in a statement, which “reveals facts pertaining to the alleged scope of Jeffrey Epstein and his criminal enterprise in the Virgin Islands.”
“One year ago, on January 25, 2020, my office first filed a civil suit against the Estate of Jeffrey Epstein. Despite the Estate’s continual refusal to cooperate with discovery, documents and information obtained from third parties, my office has uncovered extensive evidence about the lengths that Epstein and his co-conspirators went to conceal and protect their long-running sex trafficking operation, and many other fraudulent actions,” George said in a statement to the Washington Examiner.
Daniel Weiner, an attorney for Indyke and Kahn, told the Washington Examiner that his clients “categorically reject the allegations of misconduct made for the first time yesterday by the Attorney General of the Virgin Islands regarding their purported roles in the so-called ‘Epstein Enterprise.’ The facts are clear: neither Mr. Indyke nor Mr. Kahn had any involvement in any misconduct by Mr. Epstein of any kind, at any time.”
“It is enormously regrettable that the Attorney General chose to level false allegations and to unfairly malign the Co-Executors’ reputation without any proof or factual basis to do so,” Weiner added. “If the Attorney General actually had in mind the best interests of Mr. Epstein’s victims, she would grant the Co-Executors’ repeated requests that she immediately release her liens on the two Virgin Islands properties owned by the Estate and allow the Co-Executors to sell those properties to fund the Epstein Victims’ Compensation Program, a voluntary, non-adversarial compensation program conceived and implemented by the Co-Executors and paid for entirely by the Epstein Estate. To date, the Estate has funded that Program with over $87 million to pay claims made through it; the Co-Executors continue to diligently attempt to raise additional funds for use in that Program.”
Epstein pleaded guilty in 2008 to two state prostitution charges stemming from a case in Florida, and he was sentenced to 18 months in prison. He only served about 13 months, and he spent most days on leave in his prison office. As part of the plea deal, Epstein also had to register as a sex offender and was required to reach financial settlements with dozens of his victims.
George alleges that the plea agreement ultimately led Epstein to target women overseas who supposedly were easier targets.
Following the plea deal, “Epstein began to focus on producing and abusing women from Eastern Europe. These women’s immigration status and language barriers made them more isolated, dependent, and vulnerable to Epstein’s abuse and manipulation,” according to the amended complaint.
Epstein was arrested in July 2019 on federal sex trafficking and conspiracy charges for allegedly abusing girls as young as 14. He was found dead at the age of 66 in his Manhattan prison cell that August in what the New York City medical examiner determined to be a suicide.
Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s longtime associate, was arrested in July 2020 and charged with conspiring with Epstein to recruit, groom, and sexually abuse underage girls, as well as committing perjury in depositions regarding Epstein. The British socialite has said that she “vigorously denies the charges” and pleaded not guilty. She was denied bail by Judge Alison Nathan of the Southern District of New York in July, and her trial is set for the summer of 2021.
