French modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel, a close associate of the late disgraced billionaire and alleged pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, has been detained in France on accusations of sex crimes.
Brunel, 74, was detained in Paris on Wednesday after attempting to board a flight to Dakar, the capital of Senegal, prosecutors announced, according to numerous outlets. The department also said that Brunel’s detainment was part of an investigation opened in 2019 into allegations of rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment.
He has previously denied all allegations of wrongdoing and even sued Epstein in 2015, claiming that the financier had caused him personal and professional damage through allegations of sexual misconduct.
Epstein was found dead in his cell in August 2019 as he awaited the outcome of being charged with rape and sex trafficking.
“This is huge news. I am crying with joy,” said Thysia Huisman, a former Dutch model who has accused Brunel of drugging and raping her when she was 18 years old, of his arrest.
Documents unsealed in a New York court around the time of Epstein’s death reveal a history of Brunel allegedly acting as a recruiter of underage girls for Epstein and his inner circle.
“I strongly deny having committed any illicit act or any wrongdoing in the course of my work as a scouter or model agencies manager,” Brunel said in 2015. “I have exercised with the utmost ethical standard for almost 40 years.”
Epstein, who was already a convicted sex offender, allegedly sexually exploited and abused dozens of minor girls at his homes in Manhattan, New York, and Palm Beach, among other locations, between 2002 and 2005, and perhaps beyond. Prosecutors claimed Epstein built a “vast network of underage victims.”
One of his other associates, Ghislaine Maxwell, was charged with conspiring with Epstein to recruit, groom, and sexually abuse underage girls, as well as perjury in depositions regarding Epstein in July. The charging document against Maxwell said that, “as a part and in furtherance of their scheme to abuse minor victims,” Maxwell and Epstein “enticed and caused minor victims to travel to Epstein’s residences in different states,” and that Maxwell “knew and intended [this action] would result in their grooming for and subjection to sexual abuse” by Epstein.
