Jeffrey Epstein victims sue FBI — accuse agency of cover-up, enabling sex trafficking operation

A dozen anonymous Jeffrey Epstein victims filed a lawsuit against the Federal Bureau of Investigation on Wednesday, accusing the agency of a cover-up and enabling the financier's sex trafficking operations, Reuters reported.

The women claim that the FBI attempted to cover up its failure to investigate allegations made against Epstein. The lawsuit states that the agency's inaction enabled Epstein to continue committing sex trafficking crimes for over two decades.

According to the women, the FBI received tips about Epstein's criminal activity as early as 1996 but failed to interview those alleged victims or notify other law enforcement agencies. The complaint stated that the bureau did not open an investigation into the late financier until 2006 and ended its probe just two years later. The closure of the investigation coincided with Epstein pleading guilty to a prostitution charge in Florida, for which he served 18 months in prison.

The FBI continued to receive tips that Epstein was involved in sex trafficking that ultimately went ignored, the lawsuit alleged. He was arrested in 2019 and died months later while in custody.

"As a direct and proximate cause of the FBI's negligence, plaintiffs would not have been continued to be sex trafficked, abused, raped, tortured and threatened," the women's suit stated. "Jane Does 1-12 bring this lawsuit to get to the bottom — once and for all — of the FBI's role in Epstein's criminal sex trafficking ring."

The complaint alleged that the agency "had photographs, videos and interviews and hard evidence of child prostitution and failed to timely investigate and arrest Epstein in deviation from the FBI protocols."

"The FBI had a non-discretionary obligation, governed by established policies, procedures, rules, and protocols, to handle and investigate tips concerning potential and ongoing underage child erotica, rape, sex with minors, and sex trafficking in a reasonable manner and to act against Epstein and to prevent him from committing repeated crimes," the lawsuit continued. "Yet contrary to its own established rules, the FBI failed to take appropriate action and botched and covered up investigations for years."

The victims are seeking monetary damages from the federal government.

The United States Department of Justice did not respond to a request for comment from Reuters. The FBI told CBS News that it does not comment on litigation.

In November 2022, Epstein's victims filed a lawsuit against JPMorgan Chase and Deutsche Bank, accusing the banking institutions of enabling the financier's sex trafficking ring. Before deducting legal fees, the banks agreed to pay the victims $500 million to settle the lawsuit.

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