(Forbes) Jeffrey Epstein’s victims face lengthy legal action after court documents revealed that the disgraced financier had signed a will two days before his death putting his $577 million fortune in a trust.
- Court papers filed in the U.S. Virgin Islands on Thursday, seen by the New York Post, shows that Epstein’s will places his entire fortune in trust. He signed the will on August 8, two days before he was found hanging in his cell. A source told the the Post, which broke the story, that the convicted sex offender might have wanted to “get his ducks in a row.”
- The beneficiaries of the trust were not named. Its executors are listed as lawyer Darren Indyke and businessman Richard Kahn, while a Boris Nikolic, a former advisor to Bill Gates, is named as an alternate executor. He says he was not consulted and has “no intent to fulfil these duties,” he told Bloomberg.
- The will shows Epstein held $56 million in cash, $18 million in planes, cars and boats, and $194 million in hedge fund and private equity investments, as well as multimillion-dollar homes in Palm Beach, New Mexico, Paris and New York and two Islands in the U.S. Virgin Islands, where he resided.
Surprising fact: Epstein was worth $577,672,654, his will shows—which is $18 million more than was revealed when he was in court earlier this year.
Key background: While Epstein’s death deprived his victims of the opportunity to face him in court, some have vowed to go after his multimillion-dollar estate, while the U.S. government has pledged to continue investigating potential co-conspirators. Prosecutors on Monday asked a federal judge to drop the criminal case against Epstein.
At least three women are suing Epstein’s estate, including two unidentified women who are seeking $100 million in damages. The women, who were aspiring models at the time and now live in Japan and Baltimore, claim they were paid hundreds of dollars to give Epstein a massage 15 years ago, but that they were sexually assaulted at his Manhattan mansion. In a separate case, 32-year-old Jennifer Araoz sued Epstein’s estate under the news Child Victims Act in New York last Wednesday, claiming the financier molested her when she was 14.
