USA. A 22-year-old woman has reportedly said she was sexually abused by Jeffrey Epstein in 2015 — years after he was first arrested for sex trafficking — and warned there may be a “wave” of younger victims who have yet to come forward.
The victim, identified by the Daily Mail as “Marie,” told the newspaper she was raped and sexually abused by the multi-millionaire financier during two visits to his sprawling Manhattan townhouse in the summer of 2015.
“I believe he was abusing young girls right up until the day he was arrested,” she told the newspaper.
“There are likely to be multiple young victims out there who are still in their teens, perhaps still living with their parents and too ashamed and confused to speak out,” she added.
Epstein was arrested by federal authorities in New York on sex trafficking charges last year and committed suicide in a Lower Manhattan jail cell while awaiting trial.
In the criminal case brought by the US Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of New York, Epstein was accused of abusing girls as young as 14 between 2002 and 2005.
Marie insisted to the Mail that there’s a second wave of Epstein victims who, like her, were abused by him soon before he was charged in New York.
“Most of the victims we hear about are in their 30s and 40s. It’s been incredibly hard on them but many of them are married, they have spouses, they have pulled their lives together,” she told the newspaper.
“But for the second wave of victims, we are still young, it’s still very fresh and we are still figuring things out. I saw other girls around my age, potentially younger. I’m sure he did some variation of what he did to me, to them,” she added.
Marie said she was introduced to Epstein after being scouted by one of his accomplices named Madison at a bar in Manhattan when she was 16 years old in 2014.
She told the newspaper he abused her twice at his Upper East Side townhouse, including once when he raped her after she was plied with booze at a fashion industry party in 2015.
“I had my eyes shut. It felt like forever. It was extraordinarily painful,” she told the Mail.
“I scratched him, I asked him to please stop. He didn’t stop until he was finally done. Then he just got up and left,” she added. “I felt broken. It was horrible, just horrible. I lost my virginity to him.”
Marie told the Mail she fell into depression after the abuse, but has made steps toward recovery after visiting a therapist. She’s now one of the dozens of Epstein victims applying for compensation from his estate.