A professional model recruiter who arranged for Jeffrey Epstein to meet several young women has been found dead.
The body of Daniel Siad was found in his home in Colombes, a suburb of Paris, on Monday.
His cause of death is unclear. Nanterre Judicial Court deputy public prosecutor Marie-Céline Lawrysz confirmed the 69-year-old’s death to CNN on Wednesday, with an autopsy now due to be carried out.
“An investigation to determine the cause of death was opened on Monday evening following the discovery,” she said.
Before his death, Siad told CNN that he did not know the women he funneled to Epstein were being abused. “I trusted him and believed this guy was a professional person,” he said.
“I never heard anything from anyone I introduced to him who came back to me that they had a bad situation. I believed this guy is a professional person.”
Speaking to the BBC, one woman said that Siad had introduced her to Epstein. “It was a complete set-up,” she said, adding that Siad was “essentially a professional trafficker.”
Siad’s name cropped up some 2,000 times in the Epstein Files released by the Department of Justice.
Among them, CNN reports, there are documents that show Epstein paid Siad tens of thousands of dollars.
There are messages too. In one, Siad wrote to the convicted child sex trafficker: “Cute French girl in Marrakesh… She said that she will (be) happy to meet you.”
Siad also said in correspondence in 2018 that he was on the hunt for a “good looking young assistant” for Epstein.
He also sent him an image of a woman saying that she had “potential” to be a “model” or “assistant,” and that she was “very polite.”
Epstein replied: “Too old.”
Among the 2,000 mentions in the files are pictures of women Siad found as he went through life.
According to the DoJ, some of the women he sent images of are in provocative poses.
Epstein was convicted of sex crimes in 2008, but even after this, Siad continued to work with him.
In his conversation with CNN, Siad said that Epstein had convinced him that “this would never happen with anybody” he introduced him to.
Siad was himself accused of rape by a model working in France in the 1990s, although he denied the allegations.
“An important link in the chain has just vanished into thin air, without there even having been a chance to recover the information Daniel Siad might have possessed, given that he was never questioned,” one former model, who in June gave a deposition to the police relating to Epstein, told the BBC following Siad’s death.
“Too much time has been lost... and it is yet another way for the leads to go cold. I hope we won’t have to wait another seven years to see his home searched, even though I think it is already too late.”
Epstein died in a cell in 2019 after he was indicted on federal sex trafficking charges.
The circumstances around his death have led to rampant speculation online, with some challenging the narrative that the cause was suicide by hanging.
