ST. LOUIS — Jeffrey Epstein was a monster.
That's a fact before you hit play on the Netflix documentary, titled "Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich," and something that holds strong after you finish the fourth and final episode, which was executive produced by Joe Berlinger ("Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes"). A guy who owned an island dubbed "Pedophile Island." A guy who concocted "a sexual pyramid scheme." Someone who was friends with powerful people like Bill Clinton, Prince Andrew, and even Donald Trump. Connected at the highest level and indeed filthy rich, Epstein did whatever he wanted and had help. That's what this documentary reveals. It also gives a voice to the many people who were abused by him.
What this horrifying yet compelling docu-series does is enlighten you about the numerous occasions of sexual abuse and the first rung on a ladder that includes sex trafficking. What it does is open the door for suspicion of people at the highest level, which can be scary in itself. Let's get into a few things to know and take away from this experience.
Everyone's Voice is Heard Here, but the most important one is central
You get to hear from people surrounding Epstein, the investigators that took part in the multiple cases against him, and also the women whom he abused at a young age. Those women, strong and all grown up, draw a picture of what happened behind those closed doors. How a simple massage turned into something far different and reptilian. Women who either came from a broken home or were runaways that were taken advantage of by Epstein and his longtime girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell. Women like Haley Robson, Maria and Annie Farmer, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, Michelle Licatta, Courtney Wild, and several others are heard here. There is no mercy for Epstein, Maxwell, or his former associates.
The majority of the minutes here revolve around the women recounting their experiences with Epstein, and the camera doesn't just give them a few flashy moments. It lingers on them and lets them finish what they start and gives a full transmission of their past.
Prince Andrew's defense gets even more shaky
For many years, he has denied ever being associated with Epstein or his sexual endeavors. But there's an account in the Netflix doc where Steve Scully, a former Epstein employee, states that he saw Andrew with a girl engaging in sexual foreplay. It was Roberts Giuffre who has said Andrew was a part of the abuse train and Scully identifies her as the young woman with Andrew engaging in the previously mentioned foreplay. He still stands opposed to it, even with a witness and evidence!
Bill Clinton flew with Epstein on 26 different occasions
The former President is another guy who has tried extensively to distance himself from Epstein in the past decade, but the Netflix doc reveals that a log book showed him being on Epstein's plane 26 times. While no woman had seen Clinton do anything inappropriate, he was seen on the private island numerous times. Something tells me there may have been some other stuff going down. I mean, 26 times is a lot.
The Epstein "suicide" death gets more juicy opposition
It doesn't take a lab rat to think that Epstein didn't just hang himself in the New York City Metropolitan Police Department holding cell last August. Many think he was murdered due to the fact that if the authorities squeezed him for info on some of his high-level pals taking part in his sexual schemes, Epstein could help indict a lot of them. In the Netflix doc, a new piece of evidence comes forward. Dr. Cyril Wecht, a forensic pathologist, confirms that there was no evidence that Epstein leapt or jumped from his bunk in committing suicide. He points out that the three bones broken (the horn of the hyoid bone, two around the thyroid cartilage) around the victim's neck make it highly unlikely for the suicide to have taken place with Epstein leaning forward.
Without standing firmly on the suicide or murder sides, the documentary gives more fodder to the crowd who simply didn't see it as cut and dry. All the evidence points to something more sinister than a guy not wanting to spend his life in jail and taking his own life. Or at the very least, he wasn't alone.
Epstein supposedly got the last laugh, but did he really?
One of the most tragic things about this whole ordeal is how Epstein moved all of his money into the secured US Virgin Islands bank account before he went to jail. He moved his $577 million valued estate into secure bank accounts so the women he abused reportedly from 2001-2018 couldn't see any of it. Well, two days ago, which would be less than a week after the documentary came out, an article was published on Reuters saying compensation to the victims could start paying out soon. The Attorney General for The Virgin Islands has been at the head of this campaign, noting all of the sexual predatory behavior Epstein has participated in needs to be held accountable.
This is a big deal because while a judge gave the victims their day in court to speak out on the nastiness that Epstein brought to their life (even after his death), they deserve something else from him. They should get all the compensation, or most of it. The damage he did to their lives reaches beyond dollars and cents, but it's also rejecting his last criminal ploy to keep these afflicted women from seeing restitution.
Here's the thing about the Epstein doc, something one of the victims makes a point about during the final moments of fourth episode. Let's hope this is only the beginning, the first brush fire to take off. Epstein didn't pull this off on his own. He had help, a lot of it most likely. Sometimes, a piece of journalism can be a four-part docu-series that gets the chains moving on more charges, indictments, and hopefully jail time.
My #1 question at the end of this. Why isn't Maxwell in jail? She is connected to Epstein on all of these charges, including the sexual pyramid scheme, the recruitment of girls to the island, and the sustained treatment of these women. She is supposedly hiding out in Boston in a mansion while the victims still suffer. She should be in jail. That right there tells you all you need to know about how high this criminal action reaches.
At the beginning and end of this series, you'll feel disgusted by Epstein. Right off the bat, in the first scene, he is shown being cocky and dryly glib at the deposition. He even has this slight smile on his face as officers ask him about the multiple women he abused. It was later that the mountain of evidence came raining down but right here, he's defiant in the worst way.
A revealing yet horrifying watch, "Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich" should get you talking and then some.
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