MONSTER

Epstein Accused of Abusing Male Intern in New Lawsuit

The accuser claims Epstein used him “in a sexual performance” as a teen intern.

Jeffrey Epstein’s estate is facing a new lawsuit from a man who claims the late sex-trafficker exploited him after hiring him as a high school intern in 2013. The accuser, identified as M.H. in the complaint filed Tuesday in a New York state court, claims Epstein used him “in a sexual performance” when he was less than 17 years old. According to the complaint, the man is a resident of Queens and was hired as a “financial services intern” between summer of 2013 and spring of 2014. M.H. “was sexually abused, and as a result was injured,” the complaint says, adding that he “will continued to suffer great mental pain, and is incapacitated from his usual and daily pursuits.”The four-page complaint does not include specific allegations against Epstein, who received a lenient plea deal in 2008 despite molesting scores of underage girls in Palm Beach, Florida. Epstein killed himself in a Manhattan jail in August 2019—one month after he was indicted in New York for trafficking underage girls.

The lawsuit is the second filed this year that’s a departure from the usual accusations against Epstein: that recruiters of his sex ring lured underage girls and young women to his homes around the world and coerced them into giving him sexual massages in exchange for several hundred dollars. Some women say they were raped. Last month, a woman filed a federal lawsuit claiming Epstein and his alleged accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, threatened to feed her to alligators after they brutally raped her.

It’s unclear whether M.H. submitted a claim to the Epstein Victims’ Compensation Program. The deadline to submit claims to the fund passed in March. Michael Rubin, a lawyer for M.H., declined to comment.