From: To: Cc: Subject: The Sisters Who First Tried to Take Down Jeffrey Epstein Date: Mon, 26 Aug 2019 15:30:42 +0000 The Sisters Who First Tried to Take Down Jeffrey Epstein NYT By Mike Baker 8/26/19 As more women have come forward in recent days to describe assaults at the hands of Jeffrey Epstein, finds herself distraught, wondering what might have happened if someone had taken her seriously. Twenty-four years ago, Ms. was an artist who had entered the unorthodox life Mr. Epstein lived behind the doors of his luxury estates. Mr. Epstein had offered to help her painting career, but it all came to an abrupt end one night in the summer of 1996, when she says Mr. Epstein and his companion, Ghislaine Maxwell, began violently groping her. She learned later that her M ,IM had been subjected to a troubling topless massage at Mr. Epstein's ranch in New Mexico. 111=ontacted the New York Police Department, and said she then went to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, offering to share what she knew about Mr. Epstein and the parade of y being brought to Mr. Epstein's houses. Though the bureau has never acknowledged such a contact, laid the F.B.I. must have had a record of it, because agents came back to her — years later — with questions. She also went to leaders in the New York art world that Mr. Epstein and Ms. Maxwell frequented, and the sisters tried to tell their story to a national magazine. In each case, their reports went nowhere. Final) , facin what she said were threats as a result of the sisters' claims, Ms abandoned her "I did not want another young lady to go through what went through," recent interview. pi id in a interview. "I could handle what happened to me. I coul no andle what happen to er. Mr. Epstein would continue to lure vulnerable girls into his predatory circle for another nine years before investigators began diving deep into his world. After being arrested on federal charges of sex trafficking of minors in Ne