60 Minutes Australia: Jeffrey Epstein’s International Sex Trafficking Ring

Exposing Jeffrey Epstein’s International Sex Trafficking Ring

Australian Broadcasting Corporation (2019)

Film Review

This documentary concerns the victims of Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking ring and their years’ long battle to bring him and his enablers to justice. The film specifically profiles Virginia Roberts DuFray and Courtney Wild and the New York lawyer assisting them.

Both Dufray and Wild talk about Epstein and his partner Ghislane Maxwell deliberately targeting low income with promises of masseuse training and glamorous new lives. Both women were  flown around the world in Epstein’s private plane (the Lolita Express) to have sex with Epstein’s billionaire friends, politicians and “royalty.”* Both describe threats against their families, ensuring their loyalty and silence. Wild states that Epstein forced her to have sex with other men to “blackmail them so people would owe him favors.**

The documentary goes on to explore charges the State of Florida filed against Epstein in 2005. Despite detailed affidavits from 40 victims, extensive message and flight logs documenting that Epstein was trafficking 13 to 16-year olds to the rich and famous, and the seizure of numerous sexually explicit CDs and photos from his Florida home, prosecutors allowed him to plead guilty to a lesser charge of “soliciting minors for prostitution.”

Instead of serving 45 years in prison on rape and sex trafficking charges, he spent 13 months in a private prison wing. His sentence included work release of 12 hours a day 7 days a week.

The plea deal also granted Epstein full immunity against criminal charges from other, unidentified victims.

It was largely to Wild’s 14-year battle to overturn this immunity provision that pressured federal prosecutors to bring charges against him in 2019. Owing to all the unfortunate “coincidences” that enabled him to commit suicide in a high security prison, the victims’ legal team believes he was murdered. “He knew too much about the wrong people.”

At present the mean legal focus is ongoing victim lawsuits against the Epstein estate, Brislaine Maxwell and French model agent Jean-Luc Brunel (who reportedly procured more than 1,000 girls for Maxwell). Both Maxwell and Brunel have gone into hiding.

The film closes with DuFray describing her 2002 rescue from the trafficking ring by an Australian she subsequently married. She tells her story to ABC Sixty Minutes from her new home in Australia.

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*DuFray has provided names of all her abusers in court, but except for Prince Andrew name (already publicly identifying), ongoing litigation prevents her from identifying them in the broadcast..

**The ABC documentary makes no mention of Epstein’s role in a long-established CIA scheme to entrap and blackmail politicians, ambassadors, etc by luring them into embarrassing sexual escapades and secretly videotaping them. See

Hidden in Plain Sight: The Shocking Origins of the Jeffrey Epstein Case

How the British Monarchy Subverts Democracy

The Power Behind the Throne

Press TV (2015)

Film Review

This 2015 Press TV documentary questions whether the power accorded the British monarchy is consistent with democracy. It argues the extreme wealth* of the current royal family (and their clear efforts to protect that wealth) translates into significant state power, especially as the UK has no written constitution to limit their power and privileges.

It goes on to detail a number of royal privileges and activities that directly clash with the democratic rights of British citizens.

It starts with the economic privileges Prince Charles enjoys as the personal owner of the Duchy of Cornwall:**

• Charles is the automatic heir of anyone who dies in Cornwall without a will. Thus far, he has inherited £3.3 million in this way, which he uses to fund personal projects, including a fund to pay private school bursaries. He rejects local requests to keep these funds within Cornwall.
• He’s exempt from usual requirements to obtain planning permission and use consents for any land development he engages in Cornwall.
• He’s exempt from business and capital gains tax on any income his Cornwall businesses generate.

The Prince of Wales is also notorious for the letters he writes to government ministers lobbying them about specific projects and issues. In 2005, the Guardian files a Freedom of Information Act request to obtain 27 such letters he wrote between 2004-2005. Both the Blair and the Cameron government fought the release of these letters for ten years, at a total cost of £400,000. In 2015, the British supreme court ordered them release.

The filmmakers also detail the role Princes Charles and Andrew play in lobbying Saudi Arabia and other third world dictatorships to purchase British weapons systems and fighter jets. This role directly benefits royal family members as weapons industry shareholders.

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*Altogether the royal family privately owns a £70 billion real estate and share portfolio, in addition to a £10 billion art collection. They also receive a £40-200 million taxpayer funded stipend for the official duties they perform.

**The Duchy of Cornwall is one of two royal duchies, the other being the Duchy of Lancaster. The eldest son of the reigning British monarch inherits the duchy and the title of Duke of Cornwall at birth or when their parent assumes the throne