Epstein Forums

"When I was 14 years old, I was abused by Jeffrey Epstein. He abused me until I was 17 years old. What happened to me was terrible, but what happened after that, by our own government, changed my life just as much. I came here today to ask for one simple thing - to make sure this never happens again. I filed a case under the Crime Victims Rights Act because government secretly made a deal with Jeffrey Epstein. They signed a non-prosecution agreement, they made the deal behind closed doors, they never told me, and they never told any of us. Instead, they sent letters telling me to be patient, even though they knew the case was already over. For years I believed there was an investigation happening. There wasn't. When I found out the truth, I went to my lawyer, Brad Edwards. He took my case in 2008 and he fought for me against the government for over a decade. We wanted to do the right thing for all victims. Together, we wanted answers to a simple question - how could this happen? We had to fight all the way to the 11th Circuit, which took years to get the emails between the government and Jeffrey's lawyers to help us understand what happened. When we finally got them, they showed something I will never forget. The government wasn't trying to negotiate with Epstein's lawyers, it looked like the government was trying to make him happy. They were trying to make sure that the punishment they were going to give him was ok with him - it seemed like they had forgotten that there were 40 of us kids who had been abused by him. I was so confused because where I come from, if you commit a crime, you go to jail. I have never heard the feds of letting you help them decide which crimes they were going to charge you with or if you're cool with how long you're going to spend in jail. But I thought, 'What do I know? Maybe that's how it works for rich guys.' That's how it did work for Jeffrey Epstein. Finally after 10 years of fighting, in 2019, a federal judge finally ruled that my rights and that the rights of other victims were violated by the non-prosecution agreement, but there was nothing that could be done about it. There was no remedy. I just want to say it again, I'm sorry - I have to - the court found that the government violated the law and nothing happened. That means the law - the Crime Victim's Rights Act 18USC3771 - does not matter. If the law has no consequences, it doesn't protect anybody. I was lucky to have a lawyer willing to fight for me for almost a decade - a lot of victims won't find that. Especially in this case where everybody made us feel like we were crazy. So I'm asking you to fix that. Please fix the Crime Victim's Rights Act so it could actually help victims in the future. I have my own ideas, and my lawyers have more ideas, but I really hope that if nothing comes of this, we can finally get the legislation right. There needs to be a clear definition of what it means to "meaningfully confer" with victims - I'm still not sure what that actually means, but I know it never happened for me. There must be real consequences and penalties in the statute that apply automatically when a court determines that the victims' rights have been violated. The answer after years and years of litigation cannot be nothing happened when you finally win and prove that your rights have been violated. If prosecutors choose to ignore victims, those victims voices must be put on the record, memorialized, and preserved - especially when a deal is made behind closed doors. There needs to be attorney's fees provisions so victims can find lawyers who will stand up for them. If those changes had existed back then, maybe what had happened to me and so many others would have not happened. My case against the government for violating the rights of at least 40 of us Palm Beach kids was happening from 2008 to 2019. Do you know how many other girls Jeffrey abused in that time period? I bet the FBI knows. But the point is that Epstein continued to abuse other girls in New York, New Mexico, around the world and even still here in Florida after he was released in 2019 - I'm sorry, in 2009 and everybody knew it. There were lawsuits, there are so many new articles, he was a registered sex offender and still nothing was done by the government. Not until 2019 when he was finally arrested. None of the girls - none of those girls should have ever been abused. Jeffrey Epstein should have been in jail. If he had been in jail like any other man who did the same thing as him, he would have been and there wouldn't have been a single victim after 2009. But he wasn't and he did. He abused so many girls after 2009 - at the same exact time I was asking the government why he got the deal and why they violated my rights. That is the real injustice here. That the real - that is the real thing we need to prevent from ever happening again in this country. I was there for his bail hearing in 2019 and I spoke to the judge right in front of him about how dangerous he was. The bail was denied and for the first time, I thought we might finally get justice. A month later, he was dead. Once again, the system failed us. Someone let him die in a secure prison, ensuring that he would never be held accountable for what he did to me as a kid. Since then there have been prosecutions, there have been civil cases, there have been settlements - but none of that changes what was lost and none of that fixes what was allowed to happen in the first place. We fought for years to get Jeffrey Epstein arrested. We fought to hold people accountable. We did not fight so that this could turn into something political, or so that our rights would be violated once again. I lost years of my life fighting this and so did many others. We did that so the next victim wouldn't have to. So, don't let this work be in vain. Make the Crimes Victim's Rights Act matter. Thank you so much."