The posthumous memoir of Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre has cast fresh light on the scale of abuse carried out by the pedophile financier.
Giuffre, 41, died by suicide in April this year while working on the book with co-author Amy Wallace. Released Tuesday, Nobody’s Girl explores in often harrowing detail how Giuffre was subjected to abuse by the rich and powerful and how she fought for justice.
The book’s release comes as President Donald Trump remains under intense pressure to release all of the U.S. government’s files on Epstein.
Trump himself has not been accused of any wrongdoing in relation to the disgraced financier, who died in a New York jail cell in 2019. Still, he has faced repeated questions about their past friendship.
The president is currently suing The Wall Street Journal for reporting that he sent Epstein a “bawdy” signed doodle for his 50th birthday in 2003 – only for the dead man’s estate to produce an item closely resembling the newspaper’s description of the note in compliance with a House Oversight Committee subpoena. Trump has maintained that he did not do the drawing.
Here’s a look at some of the key questions Giuffre asks in her book that, for now, remain unanswered.
Who were the U.S. politicians who Giuffre says abused her?
Epstein has been associated with well-known politicians, celebrities, and royals in both press coverage and unredacted court documents. Still, according to Giuffre, many famous connections whose names have not come to light remain.
The author writes in Nobody’s Girl that she was “trafficked to a multitude of powerful men” and continues: “Among them were a gubernatorial candidate who was soon to win election in a Western state and a former U.S. senator.”
She does not name either man, neither of whom has been referred to before, but returns to them again later when she explains that she never knew the names of some of the men to whom she was trafficked and, in some cases, could not recognize their faces in photographs.
“But others, it was as if I’d preserved their faces in an airtight vault in my head – one that had been waiting to be unlocked,” she writes. “The former governor of a Western state. A respected U.S. senator.”
What happened to Epstein’s surveillance tapes?
Trump’s FBI and Justice Department attempted to draw a line under the conspiracy theories surrounding the Epstein case with a joint statement in July.
The bureau said an internal review of all government holdings on the pedophile concluded that he left behind no “client list” of his influential friends and that there was no reason to suspect he did not end his own life in jail.
In September, FBI Director Kash Patel testified to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees that his organization has released “everything that has been lawfully permitted to be released” regarding the case.
Offering a reflection on Epstein and accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell’s motives, Giuffre writes: “One theory is that they trafficked girls to some of their influential acquaintances in the hope of being owed future favors. Another theory – which is supported by the fact that Epstein’s houses were all outfitted with video cameras in every room – is that he wanted to record men in compromising positions in order to blackmail them later.
“I don’t know if that is true, but I do know that Epstein kept a huge library of videotapes that had been recorded inside his houses. In the Manhattan townhouse, Epstein himself showed me the room in which he monitored and recorded the camera feeds.”
Giuffre writes later that her abuser “always suggested to me that those videotapes he so meticulously collected in the bedrooms and bathrooms of his various houses gave him power over others. He explicitly talked about using me and what I’d been forced to do with certain men as a form of blackmail, so these men would owe him favors.”
She returns to the question of the tapes at the end of the book, when she asks: “Where are those videotapes the FBI confiscated from Epstein’s houses? And why haven’t they led to the prosecution of any more abusers?”
The FBI and DOJ statement published after Giuffre’s death said they had “conducted an exhaustive review of investigative holdings relating to Jeffrey Epstein,” including the footage taken from his properties.
The agencies maintained that the decision not to release large amounts of the files was because they contain images of child abuse and “other pornography.” They also said they consulted numerous lawyers, analysts, and civil liberties experts before deciding.
Who is the ‘minister’ Giuffre was too afraid to name?
In one of the most explicit passages in the book, Giuffre alludes to an unnamed politician who “raped me more savagely than anyone had before.”
He is considered a “minister,” meaning a parliamentarian rather than a clergyman, and may be one of Epstein’s political connections from outside the U.S.
She writes: “We were on Epstein’s island [Little St James] when I was ordered to take this man to a cabana. Immediately, it was clear that this man, whom I’ve taken pains to describe in legal filings only as a former minister, wasn’t interested in caresses. He wanted violence.
“He repeatedly choked me until I lost consciousness and took pleasure in seeing me in fear for my life. Horrifically, this man laughed when he hurt me and got more aroused when I begged him to stop. I emerged from the cabana bleeding…
“For days, it hurt to breathe and to swallow. I got down on my knees and pleaded with him. I don’t know if Epstein feared the man or if he owed him a favor, but he wouldn’t make any promises, saying coldly of the politician’s brutality, ‘You’ll get that sometimes.’”
Towards the end of Nobody’s Girl, Giuffre reflects that, while she admires people who dare to name their abusers, “we must also protect ourselves.”
“You may notice that while I’ve named some men in this book, I have not named all the men I was trafficked to,” she states. “Partly that is because I still don’t know some of their names. Partly, too, that is because there are certain men who I fear naming.
“The man who brutally raped me toward the end of my time with Epstein and Maxwell, for example – the man whom I’ve called the former minister in court documents – I know his name, and he knows what he did to me, even though when others have sought comment from him about my allegations, he has denied them.
“I fear that this man will seek to hurt me if I say his name here.”
How much did Epstein’s acquaintances really know about the abuse?
Several high-profile people associated with Epstein have denied knowledge of his crimes and expressed regret for ever socializing with him.
Giuffre cautions readers about such statements, however. Without naming names, she writes: “Don’t be fooled by those in Epstein’s circle who say they didn’t know what Epstein was doing.
“Anyone who spent any significant amount of time with Epstein saw him touching girls in ways you wouldn’t want a creepy old man touching your daughter. They can say they didn’t know he was raping children. But they were not blind. (Not to mention the fact that many prominent people were still associating with him years after his conviction.)
“Epstein offered many of the men in his circle sex with the females he and Maxwell trafficked – both girls and women. I know because I lived it. But even the men who didn’t partake of the favors Epstein offered could see the naked photos on his walls and the naked girls on his islands or by his swimming pools.
“Epstein not only didn’t hide what was happening, he took a certain glee in making people watch. Because he could. And people did watch – scientists, fundraisers from the Ivy League and other heralded institutions, titans of industry. They watched and they didn’t care.”
If you are based in the USA, and you or someone you know needs mental health assistance right now, call the National Suicide Prevention Helpline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255). This free, confidential crisis hotline is available to everyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If you are in another country, you can go to www.befrienders.org to find a helpline near you.
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