Sex-criminal financier Jeffrey Epstein housed women he allegedly abused in several London flats in the years after UK police decided not to investigate him, a BBC investigation has revealed.
We found evidence of four flats, rented in the affluent borough of Kensington and Chelsea, in receipts, emails and bank records contained within the Epstein files. Six of the women housed in them have since come forward as victims of Epstein's abuse.
Many of them - from Russia, eastern Europe and elsewhere - were brought to the UK after the Metropolitan Police decided not to investigate Virginia Giuffre's 2015 allegation that she had been a victim of international trafficking to London.
The Met said it followed "reasonable lines of inquiry" at the time, interviewing Giuffre on multiple occasions following her complaint and co-operating with US investigators.
Some of the women housed in the London flats were coerced by Epstein to recruit others into his sex trafficking scheme, as well as regularly transported to Paris by Eurostar to visit him, according to emails in the files.
The BBC searched through millions of pages of records gathered by the US Department of Justice in its investigation of the disgraced financier, and released as part of the Epstein files, in order to piece together the most detailed picture yet of his operation in the UK.
It shows how the operation grew more extensive than was previously known - with more victims, established infrastructure such as housing, and frequent transportation of women across borders - right up to Epstein's death, despite warnings to UK police.
We are not publishing any details about the young women to protect their anonymity as the victims of sexual abuse.
Our investigation found British police had other opportunities to open an inquiry into the disgraced financier's activities in the UK, in addition to Giuffre's complaint that she had been trafficked and forced to have sex with Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor in 2001. Mountbatten-Windsor has always denied any wrongdoing.
By early 2020, a second woman had complained to the Met that she had been abused by Epstein in the UK, the BBC has established. It is not clear whether this complaint was acted on.
British authorities also knew in 2020, soon after Epstein died in jail awaiting trial, that the financier had rented at least one of the flats identified by the BBC, according to a document in the files.
Tessa Gregory, a human rights lawyer with Leigh Day, told the BBC she was "staggered" no UK police investigation had ever been launched, after we showed her examples of our findings.
"Where there are credible allegations of human trafficking, the UK state, even if no victims come forward, has a positive legal obligation to conduct a prompt, effective and independent investigation," she said.
The Met said: "We recognise our duties within Article 4 of the European Convention on Human Rights and are confident these were fulfilled." Article 4 is the right to freedom from slavery and forced labour.
Kevin Hyland, a former senior detective with the Met Police who was the UK's first Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, told us police missed opportunities to investigate the convicted sex offender.
