An alleged victim of the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein named former Presidents Trump and Clinton, billionaire Richard Branson and Prince Andrew in newly publicized court records, and claimed she had tapes of some of them having sex with Epstein’s trafficking victims.
The credibility of the witness, Sarah Ransome, has been questioned after she later admitted, according to The New Yorker Magazine, that she made up the existence of the sex tapes to protect her against harm from Epstein, who hung himself in prison in 2019.
She also claimed her emails were hacked by the CIA, that she was working with the Russians, and that she was under threat from “Special Agent forces” operating under Hillary Clinton.
Ms. Ransome’s allegations against the powerful men — and Mrs. Clinton — drew fresh attention Monday when they turned up in the latest tranche of documents made public from a now-settled lawsuit filed against Epstein and accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell by one of their victims.
Ms. Ransome’s claims, included in the lawsuit, were made in 2016 in emails sent to a New York Post reporter in a bid to get the paper to publish her story.
“Clinton and Trump must pay for what they did to us as must the rest of the men that were involved in their seedy inner circle,” Ms. Ransome wrote to then-New York Post reporter Maureen Callahan.
Ms. Ransome, in her emailed missives, pledged to stop both Mrs. Clinton and Mr. Trump, both running for president, from ever winning the election. She provided explicit and disturbing details to Ms. Callahan about what she said happened between Epstein’s victims and powerful male visitors to his private Caribbean island and other properties.
She said one of her friends “was one of the many girls that had sexual relations with Donald Trump,” including at Epstein’s home in New York “on regular occasions,” according to court documents reviewed by The Washington Times.
Ms. Ransome also told Ms. Callahan, now a columnist for the Daily Mail, that another female friend “had sexual intercourse with Clinton, Prince Andrew and Richard Branson.” She said sex tapes were filmed of each encounter, and that she was in possession of the video footage, had backed it up on USB cartridges, and “securely sent them to various different locations throughout Europe.”
Nobody has seen the tapes, however, and their existence appears to be fabricated.
Connie Brock, writing for The New Yorker in 2019, said Ms. Ransome told her “she had invented the tapes to draw attention to Epstein’s behavior, and to make him believe that she had ‘evidence that would come out if he harmed me.’”
A spokeswoman for Mr. Branson’s Virgin Group denied the claims by Ms. Ransome, pointing to the New Yorker article.
“We categorically reject all allegations made by Sarah Ransome, ” the spokeswoman said. “In 2019 she admitted to The New Yorker that the ‘tapes’ had been ‘invented.’ Any suggestion that Sir Richard Branson was involved in a ‘sex tape’ is entirely false. The allegations are baseless and unfounded.”
“The actions of Jeffrey Epstein were abhorrent and we support the right to justice for the many victims impacted by his abuse,” she said.
Ms. Ransome sued Epstein in 2017 and the case was settled. In July, she joined other Epstein victims and filed a legal notice of a planned class-action lawsuit against the FBI, alleging the agency failed to investigate their claims about Epstein.
The latest documents released Monday are among hundreds of pages from the lawsuit made public by a federal judge earlier this month. The documents, filed in federal District Court in Manhattan, were part of a settled lawsuit filed by alleged victim Virginia Giuffre against Epstein and Maxwell, who is currently serving a federal prison sentence for her role in the sex trafficking scheme.
The information includes names of luminaries who were previously revealed in flight logs kept for the disgraced financier’s private jet, dubbed the “Lolita Express.”
One female witness said that she was told by Epstein that Mr. Clinton “likes them young, referring to girls.”
But Maxwell has testified that Mr. Clinton never visited Epstein’s island, Little Saint James, where some of the abuse took place.
Mr. Trump said he was “not a fan” of Epstein and had banned him from his Mar-a-Lago club prior to 2008, when, according to a book about Trump, Epstein hit on the teenage daughter of another club member.
Prince Andrew’s name, long associated with Epstein, resurfaces in the newly disclosed documents. Witnesses in the case say they saw Andrew and his ex-wife, Sarah Ferguson, at Epstein’s home as well as presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and celebrity hairstylist Frederick Fekkai and various “Noble Prize winners.”
Ms. Giuffre settled a lawsuit with the British royal for an estimated $16 million, based on accusations Epstein and Maxwell forced her to have sex with him when she was 17 years old. He denied her charges and said he never met Ms. Giuffre.
• Susan Ferrechio can be reached at sferrechio@washingtontimes.com.
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