Washington DC, United States

In the fresh batch of the unsealed court files of Jeffrey Epstein, it has been disclosed that the defence team of the sex offender tried to undermine the credibility of one of the witnesses by revealing that she made claims of Epstein keeping "sex tapes" of prominent personalities.  

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As per allegations made by Sarah Ransome, the celebrities whose alleged sex tapes were recorded included Prince Andrew, Bill Clinton and Sir Richard Branson. A firm, which was representing Epstein’s lawyer Alan Dershowitz, had flagged her claims to demonstrate Ransome “manifestly lacks credibility”. No proof of the existence of any tapes was submitted by the court and Ransome had retracted the allegations soon after they were made initially.

Also read: Google co-founder Sergey Brin visited Jeffrey Epstein's 'paedophile island', new court docs reveal

A victim impact statement was given by Ransome before British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell was sentenced for sex trafficking. The court was provided with the emails in which she had allegedly claimed Prince Andrew, Clinton and Branson were filmed by the child sex offender. Serious accusations were also made against the former US president Donald Trump by Ransome. 

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Jeffrey filmed the sex tapes: Ransome 

As per the newly-released documents, Ransome had written in the emails: “When my friend had sexual intercourse with Clinton, Prince Andrew and Richard Branson, sex tapes were in fact filmed on each separate occasion by Jeffrey. Thank God she managed to get a hold of some footage of the filmed sex tapes, which clearly identify the faces of Clinton, Prince Andrew and Branson having sexual intercourse with her. Frustratingly enough, Epstein was not seen in any of the footage but he was clever like that."

“When my friend eventually had the courage to speak out and went to the police in 2008 to report what had happened, nothing was done and she was utterly humiliated by the police department where she went to report what had happened with Epstein, Clinton, Branson and Prince Andrew," she added. 

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In the emails, Ransome further alleged that former US president Trump “had sexual relations with [her friend] at Jeffrey’s NY mansion on regular occasions”.

Watch: Gravitas: Where is Nadia Marcinko, Epstein's 'Sex Slave' Turned Accomplice?

Emery Celli Brinckerhoff & Abady LLP, in a letter to the court, said that false allegations were made against Epstein’s lawyer Dershowitz, and added, “[Ransome’s] testimony was fabricated from whole cloth. Ms Ransome’s testimony also contains a slew of other incendiary claims concerning the sexual proclivities of Donald Trump, Bill Clinton and other prominent individuals. The emails are a necessary antidote to Ms Ransome’s deposition misstatements because they demonstrate she manifestly lacks credibility.”

Soon after, Ransome withdrew her claims and said, “I want to walk away from this … I shouldn’t have contacted you and I’m sorry I wasted your time. It’s not worth coming forward and I will never be heard anyhow and only bad things will happen as a consequence of me going public.”

“In a New Yorker report published in 2019, Ransome admitted that she had ‘invented’ the tapes. We can confirm that Sarah Ransome’s claims are baseless and unfounded," said a Virgin Group spokesperson.

In one of the email extracts, Ransome, aiming at Hillary Clinton, is reported to have said, "I will make sure that neither that evil b***h Hillary or that paedophile Trump gets elected. I will also make sure that everyone on the God damn planet sees that footage and photos and will release them to WikiLeaks by Sunday.”

(With inputs from agencies)