Epstein Victim Quotes

Alexander Acosta, the US attorney for the Southern District of Florida, approved the nonprosecution agreement behind closed doors without consulting with (and while actively misleading) Epstein’s victims.

The other charges alleged that from 1994 to 1997, Maxwell helped Epstein recruit, groom, and sexually abuse girls as young as fourteen years old. These initial charges mentioned three unidentified minor victims, though

This vacillation between assertion and denial in discussions about organised abuse can be understood as functional, in that it serves to contain the traumatic kernel at the heart of allegations of organised abuse. In his influential ‘just world’ theory, Lerner (1980) argued that emotional wellbeing is predicated on the assumption that the world is an orderly, predictable and just place in which people get what they deserve. Whilst such assumptions are objectively false, Lerner argued that individuals have considerable investment in maintaining them since they are conducive to feelings of self—efficacy and trust in others. When they encounter evidence contradicting the view that the world is just, individuals are motivated to defend this belief either by helping the victim (and thus restoring a sense of justice) or by persuading themselves that no injustice has occurred. Lerner (1980) focused on the ways in which the ‘just world’ fallacy motivates victim-blaming, but there are other defences available to bystanders who seek to dispel troubling knowledge. Organised abuse highlights the severity of sexual violence in the lives of some children and the desire of some adults to inflict considerable, and sometimes irreversible, harm upon the powerless. Such knowledge is so toxic to common presumptions about the orderly nature of society, and the generally benevolent motivations of others, that it seems as though a defensive scaffold of disbelief, minimisation and scorn has been erected to inhibit a full understanding of organised abuse. Despite these efforts, there has been a recent resurgence of interest in organised abuse and particularly ritualistic abuse (eg Sachs and Galton 2008, Epstein et al. 2011, Miller 2012).

I’m sorry to say that for all that’s happened, more action is needed. Much more. Because some people still think Epstein was an anomaly, an outlier. And those people are wrong. While the sheer number of victims Epstein preyed upon may put him in a class by himself, he was no outlier. The way he viewed women and girls—as playthings to be used and discarded—is not uncommon among certain powerful men who believe they are above the law. And many of those men are still going about their daily lives, enjoying the benefits of their power.

Some readers may find it a curious or even unscientific endeavour to craft a criminological model of organised abuse based on the testimony of survivors. One of the standard objections to qualitative research is that participants may lie or fantasise in interview, it has been suggested that adults who report severe child sexual abuse are particularly prone to such confabulation. Whilst all forms of research, whether qualitative or quantitative, may be impacted upon by memory error or false reporting. there is no evidence that qualitative research is particularly vulnerable to this, nor is there any evidence that a fantasy— or lie—prone individual would be particularly likely to volunteer for research into child sexual abuse. Research has consistently found that child abuse histories, including severe and sadistic abuse, are accurate and can be corroborated (Ross 2009, Otnow et al. 1997, Chu et al. 1999). Survivors of child abuse may struggle with amnesia and other forms of memory disturbance but the notion that they are particularly prone to suggestion and confabulation has yet to find a scientific basis. It is interesting to note that questions about the veracity of eyewitness evidence appear to be asked far more frequently in relation to sexual abuse and rape than in relation to other crimes. The research on which this book is based has been conducted with an ethical commitment to taking the lives and voices of survivors of organised abuse seriously.

People are particularly judgmental about our receiving money from him. My response to that is anger. The DOJ—not Epstein’s victims—made the secret deal that ultimately let Epstein off the hook in 2008: Alexander Acosta, the US attorney for the Southern District of Florida, approved the nonprosecution agreement behind closed doors without consulting with (and while actively misleading) Epstein’s victims. Afterward, those of us whom Epstein had abused were told that was the end of it—Epstein wouldn’t be prosecuted, no matter how much we wanted him to be. We were also told that extracting money from him was the only way to punish him. (Remember that it was the DOJ that connected me with a lawyer so I could sue.) But here’s the real reason I’m angry at those who judge victims who settle: all that legalese in our lawsuits about pain and suffering and mental anguish—those things are real. And getting treatment for them costs money.

First, it was Eva Andersson, then it was Ghislaine Maxwell, and now it was Nadia Marcinkova. Anyone who reached girlfriend status had also proven a commitment to a lifetime of allegiance and unwavering friendship. He once famously said that when a relationship is over, the girlfriend "moves up, not down" to friendship status.

Many times people confuse winning and losing,” Wexner says. “Jeffrey has the unusual quality of knowing when he is winning. Whether in conversations or negotiations, he always stands back and lets the other person determine the style and manner of the conversation or negotiation. And then he responds in their style. Jeffrey sees it in chivalrous terms. He does not pick a fight, but if there is a fight, he will let you choose your weapon.

Research on organised abuse emphasises the diversity of organised abuse cases, and the ways in which serious forms of child maltreatment cluster in the lives of children subject to organised victimisation (eg Bibby 1996b, Itziti 1997, Kelly and Regan 2000). Most attempts to examine organised abuse have been undertaken by therapists and social workers who have focused primarily on the role of psychological processes in the organised victimisation of children and adults. Dissociation, amnesia and attachment, in particular, have been identified as important factors that compel victims to obey their abusers whilst inhibiting them from disclosing their abuse or seeking help (see Epstein et al. 2011, Sachs and Galton 2008). Therapists and social workers have surmised that these psychological effects are purposively induced by perpetrators of organised abuse through the use of sadistic and ritualistic abuse. In this literature, perpetrators are characterised either as dissociated automatons mindlessly perpetuating the abuse that they, too, were subjected to as children, or else as cruel and manipulative criminals with expert foreknowledge of the psychological consequences of their abuses. The therapist is positioned in this discourse at the very heart of the solution to organised abuse, wielding their expertise in a struggle against the coercive strategies of the perpetrators. Whilst it cannot be denied that abusive groups undertake calculated strategies designed to terrorise children into silence and obedience, the emphasis of this literature on psychological factors in explaining organised abuse has overlooked the social contexts of such abuse and the significance of abuse and violence as social practices.

There are those who’ve criticized Epstein’s victims for entering into confidential settlements with Epstein because, they assert, that allowed him to sweep his problems under the rug. People are particularly judgmental about our receiving money from him. My response to that is anger. The DOJ—not Epstein’s victims—made the secret deal that ultimately let Epstein off the hook in 2008: Alexander Acosta, the US attorney for the Southern District of Florida, approved the nonprosecution agreement behind closed doors without consulting with (and while actively misleading) Epstein’s victims.

In November 2018, Brown’s series of articles, accompanied by Michot’s videos, went live. The series was called “Perversion of Justice,” and in it, Brown revealed the behind-the-scenes maneuvering that had led to Epstein’s nonprosecution agreement, zeroing in on Acosta’s role in it. She uncovered eighty victims of Epstein, some as young as thirteen when the abuse occurred, and revealed the campaign of terror that Epstein and his cronies had used to try to silence those victims. (Remember when that car shined its headlights on our front door in Colorado? Well, Brown found a victim in Florida who’d endured the same kind of hazing.) Finally, the series documented the experience of eight survivors in detail, with on-the-record interviews. I was among them.

How much did you make last year?” he asked me. “Why?” I responded. He quickly told me that he would pay my yearly salary to settle our personal case. Without even considering the idea, I said, "That's not fair." Rather than disagree, he retorted, “Well, what does fairness mean to you?” I thought about it for a few seconds and said, “You know it when you see it. I can't give you a universal definition, but at the very least, it means that you take into consideration all factors and not just one.” He surprised me again by inquiring, “tell me all of the factors I should be considering.” From that moment forward, he would incorporate the concept of fairness into every substantive discussion that we would ever have. Not because he believed in it, but because he knew I did. Once he grasped the notion that my entire way of dealing with an adversary was in terms of fairness, he began to speak my language. Whether he was conveying an offer, a counteroffer, or just a general principle of life, he would couch his position in terms of what was fair or unfair.

(including Britain’s Prince Andrew, Joe Biden, former New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, former Sen. George Mitchell,[329] and numerous others that victims have also named[330]), clergy, and Hollywood insiders who will eventually be arrested

The don in Crampton Hodnet being gossiped about does not win much sympathy as a victim, for, about to go off on a trip with a colleague he does not much like, he thinks that "at least they would be able to have a good talk about old times, rejoicing over those of their contemporaries who had not fulfilled their early promise and belittling those who had.

It is by now a truism that the victim is often blamed for the crime. Perpetrators tend to deny, repress, forget. Victims attempt to master trauma by assuming responsibility for it.

Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story by Julie K. Brown 1 highlight “What society wants is a victim who is a sweet, adorable, innocent angel that God sent from heaven—and an offender who is this evil horrible sexual predator, a ‘dirty old man in a wrinkled raincoat,’ that’s what we prefer, but that’s not reality,” Lanning said.

What society wants is a victim who is a sweet, adorable, innocent angel that God sent from heaven

What society wants is a victim who is a sweet, adorable, innocent angel that God sent from heaven—and an offender who is this evil horrible sexual predator, a ‘dirty old man in a wrinkled raincoat,’ that’s what we prefer, but that’s not reality,” Lanning said.

The Jews have been victim to a general envy by the unsuccessful for the successful. Forced out of their homeland 2,000 years ago by Roman oppression, they spread across Europe and prospered spectacularly in many places, including Vienna and Berlin, till Hitler took over. Joseph Epstein tells us that in the ‘Vienna of 1936, a city that was 90 per cent Catholic and 9 per cent Jewish, Jews accounted for 60 per cent of the city’s lawyers, more than half its physicians, more than 90 per cent of its advertising executives, and 123 of its 174 newspaper editors. And this is not to mention the prominent places Jews held in banking, retailing, and intellectual and artistic life. The numbers four or five years earlier for Berlin are said to have been roughly similar.’61 Is it surprising that Nazism had its greatest resonance in these two cities? Before killing the Jews, Germans and Austrians felt the need to humiliate their victims: ‘They had Jewish women cleaning floors, had Jewish physicians scrubbing the cobblestone streets of Vienna with toothbrushes as Nazi youth urinated on them and forced elderly Jews to do hundreds of deep knee bends until they fainted or sometimes died. All this suggests a vicious evening of the score that has the ugly imprint of envy on the loose. The Jews in Germany and Austria had succeeded not only beyond their numbers but also, in the eyes of the envious,

I will always be grateful for what Brown and Michot did for the countless women who’d been victimized—first by Epstein and Maxwell, but then again by their own government.

many of the assaults allegedly took place include Ehud Barak, Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton, and Alan Dershowitz, a close friend of Epstein who also served as his attorney. Dershowitz was accused in 2015 of raping a teenage girl procured by Epstein in the 1990s, and in 2019 he was sued by a victim who claimed he aided in

In the 2000s, Epstein had taken Bill Clinton for rides on his plane, nicknamed the “Lolita Express.” Epstein’s criminal partner, Ghislaine Maxwell, was a guest at Chelsea Clinton’s wedding in 2010—meaning that both 2016 presidential candidates, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, had at the least an acquaintance with Epstein, though Clinton was never accused of abuse by an Epstein victim.