Where Are The Men Who Should Be Held to Account?
Jeffrey Epstein may be dead, but the power structure that enabled him endures—and the 2022 Cannes Film Festival is Exhibit A that his activities continue without him
Ghislaine Maxwell boarding her father's yacht "The Lady Ghislaine” in 1991. (Photo by Mathieu Polak/Sygma/Sygma via Getty Images)
Ghislaine Maxwell is set to learn her fate this morning. If everything goes according to plan (see my coverage from yesterday about why it might not), she will be sentenced on three of the counts on which she was found guilty: sex trafficking, conspiracy, and transportation of a minor with the intent to engage in illegal sexual activity. The government has asked for a sentence of no less than 30 years. If Judge Nathan chooses to grant that, it will mean Maxwell will likely spend the rest of her natural life in jail.
Once sentenced, Maxwell will be the only person formally held to account for the crimes perpetuated—yes by her, but also by Jeffrey Epstein.
Maxwell has been found guilty of committing these crimes, and she should undoubtedly pay the price for them. But—and it’s a “but” even the lawyers of some of her victims have stressed—she did not act alone. Even the charges themselves imply the involvement of other people—minors aren’t sex trafficked to no one. Trafficking requires another person’s involvement: the person to whom the minor is trafficked.
Throughout the trial this past winter, the names of many rich and powerful men made cameos in the courtroom—the men who flew on Epstein’s planes, the men who paid Epstein handsomely for his mysterious financial wizardry—but those men largely blurred into the background. What were the men doing on Epstein’s plane and on Epstein’s island? What does Darren Indyke, Epstein’s long-time lawyer, know about his client’s activities? Will we ever find out? And if not, why not? What are the flaws in our legal system than enable such silence? We should push for those answers, that accountability.
The wealthy gaggle of men who hung around Epstein—some even after he was a known sex offender—have just flitted back to their lives, no questions (as far as we know) asked by prosecutors.
Sure, we have seen ripples of repercussions. Joi Ito lost his job at the MIT Media Lab for taking money from Epstein—a self-professed “error in judgment.” Bill Gates finally came forward and admitted his association with Epstein was “a huge mistake”; it reportedly played a major role in his divorce. Prince Andrew paid a settlement to his accuser Virginia Roberts Guiffre and was stripped of his royal title.
But in the context of the larger crimes, these all seem like paltry prices to pay.
There was an entire circle of male power that surrounded Jeffrey Epstein. Just this weekend, I learned from someone whose anonymity I promised to protect that the same web continues apace. I am told that, during the Cannes Film Festival this year, $10,000 in cash was exchanged in order for 20 models (of unknown ages) to be bussed from Milan to the French riviera.
The trafficking of human females is still a lucrative business. And it’s run by men. It was this web that held up Epstein’s entire sex-trafficking enterprise. Without these men, Jeffrey Epstein wouldn’t have been propped up to run his criminal sexual enterprise.
Jeffrey Epstein may be dead, but the power structure that enabled him endures, even three years after his death.
The point of patriarchal power based on wealth is that it is complicated. It is visible but also not—and therein lies the trickiness of dealing with it. (I was also told this weekend that it was astonishing that “no one came after me,” given what I revealed in “Chasing Ghislaine”.) But that is the point of power: If you have it, you know how to hide from trouble. The weaker links are the patsies.
During my reporting on this case, I heard time and time again that Epstein recorded the powerful people who came into his orbit.
“There are many stories from people I know and who I trust who said they saw photographs that Jeffrey had of powerful people with young women,” investigative journalist Ed Epstein (no relation) told me.
Epstein’s accusers have also said he taped them. One alleged that he kept dossiers on them to keep them in line and that there was a room in his Upper East Side mansion that was “filled with screens.” What happened to that video footage remains one of the biggest questions of this case: Where is it?
This is, at its heart, a story about very, very rich men covering for each other. And who knows what exactly they’re covering?
Their reputations and their very lives depend on the truth never getting out.
So, remember that as Ghislaine Maxwell goes down. She’s going down for herself, yes. But she’s also going down for them. And, well, that’s a problem.
I was a bit perplexed by this. There is little to no evidence that the men you refer to were aware of Epstein's issues in Florida in '05.
As for those who flew on his planes or went to receptions, etc...what's the problem with that? In his "day job" role, Epstein had credentials that suggested he had great wealth and was deeply interested in science. Dumping Joi from MIT over a contribution is absurd. Also, Bill Gates had help revolutionize the world and saved tens of millions of lives in Africa. No one suggests that he had sex with underage girls. Heavens -- there was a photo of Hillary Clinton smiling with that mass murderer in Chicago. And how about all those famous people who huddle around her husband -- a man convicted of perjury for lying about exposing himself to a state worker and subject to accusations of rape by a professional woman. And that's without getting into the Monica story -- which his admirers do know -- and the other stories about his appalling treatent of women under his management.
Famous people associate with and meet many other wealthy people who may be quite unattractive as human beings. I think the accusations here are a bit too sweeping, e.g. "The point of patriarchal power based on wealth is that it is complicated. It is visible but also not—and therein lies the trickiness of dealing with it." What is the "patriarchy" and who are its members? And what have they done that is wrong?
Regarding the women -- the sex with the underage girls was appalling. But for those of age -- many of them were in effect prostitutes -- and Giuffre, who hung around for three years, was not merely a prostitute, she was a pimp as well -- notoriously involved in procuring other girls for Epstein's tawdry harem. So Prince Andrew may or may not have had sex with her. What's the issue there? Should he have asked for her ID?
The ugly world of Epstein is quite complex. What is served by seeing his videos, if they exist, with prominent men? Unless one knows the girls were underage...who knows what the men knew. A lot of these girls, when of age, were not "trafficked." Trafficking is when you have no choice and are, in effect, physically captive. Girls like Giuffre lived in Epstein-subsidized apartments and came and went as they pleased. She and others like her were not trafficked.