Here's the latest on the Jeffrey Epstein documents.
The names of several people connected to him were unsealed
Wednesday.
Senior Investigative correspondent Aaron Katersky is here with the follow.
Good morning, Aaron George. Good morning to you.
The 1st 40 of about
275 previously secret documents have been released now,
and while much of what's in them has been known
before,
they do contain some new details about an old groping
accusation against Prince Andrew and an effort to depose former
President Bill Clinton.
This morning, newly unsealed court records reinforced the Association of
Presidents,
Even the King of Pop,
with Jeffrey Epstein, the sex offender who killed himself in
a New York City jail while awaiting trial.
The documents were part of a long settled defamation lawsuit
one of Epstein's victims,
Virginia Giuffre, filed against his former Paramore,
Glenn Maxwell. The documents include arguments by Giuffre's lawyers who
sought testimony from former President Bill Clinton,
calling him a key person who can provide information about
his close relationship with Maxwell and Mr.
Epstein. Jeffrey never accused Clinton of wrongdoing but claims she
had dinner with him on
Epstein's private Caribbean island. Maxwell called that a lie,
and the documents show her attorney said.
Each and every part of plaintiff's claims regarding President Clinton
has conclusively been proven false.
Clinton was never deposed. After Epstein's arrest,
his spokesman denied Clinton was ever on the island.
After Jeffrey's allegations became public,
the documents also show Epstein emailed Maxwell seeming to offer
advice.
You can issue a reward to any of
Virginia's friends, acquaintances, family that come forward and help prove
her allegations are false.
The strongest is the Clinton dinner.
Jeffrey claims she was a teen sex slave for Epstein
and directed by him and Maxwell to have sex with
powerful men.
As she described in a 2019 interview with the Miami
Herald.
The training started immediately. How to
be quiet, Be subservient, give Jeffrey what he wants.
A lot of this training came from Gillan herself.
Jeffrey claimed Epstein ordered her to have sex on three
occasions with Britain's Prince Andrew,
which he has denied. He said he could not recall
meeting her,
and he told the BBC this photo of the two
of them could be fake.
I have absolutely no memory
of that photograph ever been taken.
Andrew settled A lawsuit with Jeffrey in
2022. The documents include testimony from Johanna Schoberg,
one of Epstein's accusers, who said she was seated next
to Jeffrey at
Epstein's New York City mansion when Andrew groped her breast.
But when asked do you have any knowledge about whether
Virginia is telling the truth about whether Glenn Maxwell directed
her to have sex with Prince Andrew,
Schoberg answered no. Only based on what I've read in
the media,
when asked about meeting other famous people,
she said she met Michael Jackson at
Epstein's house in Palm Beach.
And when she was asked did you ever massage Donald
Trump?
Schoberg responded No. There are more documents to come later
today,
Jew Phrase Lawyer has said.
The public has rightly demanded to know how Epstein operated
his vast global sex trafficking enterprise
and got away with it for so long.
George. OK, Aaron. Thanks. Let's bring our chief legal analyst
Dan Abrams.
Dan case settled in 2017.
Why are the documents coming out now?
Long standing legal fight over whether these names should be
released.
A lot of this information has been out right.
The question was who's who in connection with the information.
Remember, typically legal documents are public,
right? The presumption is when you file something in a
court of law,
it's public. There are exceptions,
though, when it comes to cases involving children or sexual
assault.
This case had a little bit of all of that.
And so there have been legal battles where the judge
basically said to any of the people identified,
if you want to challenge your name being made public,
tell me why you can challenge it.
16 people did that. Some of them were successful,
others were not. But the judge gave everyone an opportunity
to say,
I want to keep my name out of this,
but you got to have a reason for it.
Yeah. Not everyone fought it though.
Yeah. Which is interesting, right?
I think for a lot of these high profile people,
there was a cost benefit analysis,
right. Which is the sense of,
huh, this is probably going to be made public anyway,
Maybe I'm going to lose this anyway.
Is it really worth my being seen as having fought
it if it's going to be made public anyway?
That makes some sense right there.
Finally, do you think there are any
any chance that charges could come from this?
I think it's very unlikely.
I mean, look, there's a lot of quote,
UN quote new information coming out,
but it's not new to the authorities,
right? It's new to us,
the public, For the first time,
we're seeing the names behind what is alleged here.
But the people involved, the lawyers involved,
the authorities have all known this information.
It's just that the public is learning for the first
time some of the names behind the various things that
are alleged to have happened in connection with the civil
lawsuit. Again, that happened a long time ago.
Dan Abrams, thanks very much.