COURTS
Suit filed on behalf of alleged victims of the convicted sex offender and financier
New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez has filed a federal lawsuit against the co-executors of the estate of the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein on behalf of women who allege they were abused at Zorro Ranch in Santa Fe County.
The complaint alleges that Epstein ran a sex trafficking enterprise and that Epstein’s former attorney, Darren Indyke, and his former accountant, Richard Kahn, knowingly participated and helped conceal the abuse.
“Mr. Indyke and Mr. Kahn, as co-executors and beneficiaries, stand to benefit substantially from the distribution of resources out of that trust without some intervening action, which is at the heart of what we are doing today,” Torrez said in a news conference Wednesday in Albuquerque where he announced the lawsuit.
New Mexico is asking a judge to prevent Indyke and Kahn, co-executors of Epstein’s estate, from receiving estate payments while the case proceeds.
The suit, filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the District of New Mexico, is the first state-led case against the two men. The criminal investigationannounced earlierthis year is ongoing.
The estate is currently valued at more than $107 million. Indyke and Kahn are eligible for bequests of $50 million and $25 million, subject to the availability of funds, according to the complaint.
Torrez, while standing beside alleged Epstein survivors Julia Molchanova and Anouska De Georgiou, said that the men in the lawsuit “stand to benefit substantially” if the resources from Epstein’s trust — including the estate — were distributed to them without intervention.
He added that he felt New Mexico and the nation failed to fulfill their obligation to protect survivors and called Epstein’s trafficking operation “one of the most horrific criminal enterprises in modern American history.”
Molchanova and De Georgiou took to the lectern to show their support for the lawsuit, stating that the complaint sought answers into Epstein’s co-conspirators.
“Accountability cannot end with Epstein and (Ghislaine) Maxwell,” said De Georgiou, dressed in all black as she addressed a crowd of reporters. “It must extend to those who knowingly made their abuse possible, especially those who stand to profit from it.”
De Georgiou was a successful teenage model in the 1990s from an affluent family in London when she first met Epstein, who invited her to his properties around the world where she was trafficked for sex, she told NBC News.
Molchanova, a 37-year-old Russian-born woman, met Epstein in 2011 during a trip to New York City, The Wall Street Journal reported in September. Epstein lured her into his “cult” with a promise to help her get admitted to the prestigious Fashion Institute of Technology, which never panned out, she told the newspaper.
“I believe these answers are long overdue,” Molchanova said at the news conference. “I find it deeply troubling that Darren Indyke and Richard Kahn stand to receive millions from Epstein’s estate while survivors continue to live with the consequences of his actions.”
