Virginia Giuffre, who accused Britain’s Prince Andrew and other influential men of sexually exploiting her as a teenager trafficked by financier Jeffrey Epstein, has died. She was 41.
Giuffre died by suicide Friday at her farm in Western Australia, her publicist confirmed.
“Virginia was a fierce warrior in the fight against sexual abuse and sex trafficking. She was the light that lifted so many survivors,” her family said in a statement. “Despite all the adversity she faced in her life, she shone so bright. She will be missed beyond measure.”
Her publicist Dini von Mueffling described Giuffre as “deeply loving, wise and funny.”
“She adored her children and many animals. She was always more concerned with me than with herself,” von Mueffling wrote in a statement. “I will miss her beyond words. It was the privilege of a lifetime to represent her.”
EDITOR’S NOTE: This story includes discussion of suicide. If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in Australia is available by calling 13 11 14. In the US, it is available by calling or texting 988. There is also an online chat at 988lifeline.org
The American-born Giuffre, who lived in Australia for years, became an advocate for sex trafficking survivors after emerging as a central figure in Epstein’s prolonged downfall.
The wealthy, well-connected New York money manager killed himself in August 2019 while awaiting trial on US federal sex trafficking charges involving dozens of teenage girls and young women, some as young as 14. The charges came 14 years after police in Palm Beach, Florida, first began investigating allegations that he sexually abused underage girls who were hired to give him massages.
Giuffre came forward publicly after the initial investigation ended in an 18-month Florida jail term for Epstein, who made a secret deal to avoid federal prosecution by pleading guilty instead to relatively minor state-level charges of soliciting prostitution. He was released in 2009.
In subsequent lawsuits, Giuffre said she was a teenage spa attendant at Mar-a-Lago — President Donald Trump’s Palm Beach club — when she was approached in 2000 by Epstein’s girlfriend and later employee, Ghislaine Maxwell.
Giuffre said Maxwell hired her as a masseuse for Epstein, but the couple effectively made her a sexual servant, pressuring her into gratifying not only Epstein but his friends and associates. Giuffre said she was flown around the world for assignations with men including Prince Andrew while she was 17 and 18.
The men denied it and assailed Giuffre’s credibility. She acknowledged changing some key details of her account, including the age at which she first met Epstein.
But many parts of her story were supported by documents, witness testimony and photos — including one of her and Andrew, with his his arm around her bare midriff, in Maxwell’s London townhouse.
Giuffre said in one of her lawsuits that she had sex with the royal three times: in London during her 2001 trip, at Epstein’s New York mansion when she was 17 and in the Virgin Islands when she was 18.
“Ghislaine said, ‘I want you to do for him what you do for Epstein,’” Giuffre told NBC News’ “Dateline” in September 2019.
Andrew categorically rejected Giuffre’s allegations and said he didn’t recall having met her.
His denials blew up in his face during a November 2019 BBC interview. Viewers saw a prince who proffered curious rebuttals — such as disputing Giuffre’s recollection of sweaty dancing by saying he was medically incapable of perspiring — and showed no empathy for the women who said Epstein abused them.
Within days of the interview, Andrew stepped down from his royal duties. He settled with Giuffre in 2022 for an undisclosed sum, agreeing to make a “substantial donation” to her survivors’ organization. A statement filed in court said that the prince acknowledged Epstein was a sex trafficker and Giuffre “an established victim of abuse.”
She also filed, and in at least some cases settled, lawsuits against Epstein and others connected to him. In one case, she dropped her claims against a prominent US attorney, saying she might have erred in identifying him as one of the men to whom Epstein supplied her.
Epstein’s suicide put an end to his accusers’ hopes of holding him criminally accountable.
Maxwell was convicted in 2021 on federal sex trafficking and conspiracy charges and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. She said she wasn’t to blame for Epstein’s abuse.
Prosecutors elected not to include Giuffre’s allegations in the Maxwell case, but Giuffre later told the court that the British socialite had “opened the door to hell.”
Giuffre, born Virginia Roberts, told interviewers that her childhood was shattered when she was sexually abused as a grade-schooler by a man her family knew. She later ran away from home and endured more abuse, she said.
She said she met her now-husband in 2002 while taking massage training in Thailand at Epstein’s behest. She married, moved to Australia and had a family.
Giuffre founded an advocacy charity, SOAR, in 2015.
Giuffre was hospitalized after a serious accident, her publicist said last month. She didn’t answer questions at the time about the date, location, nature or other specifics of the accident and about the accuracy of an Instagram post that appeared to come from Giuffre. The post said she had been in a car that was hit by a school bus and her prognosis was dire.
She is survived by her three children, whom the statement described as the “light of her life.”
Sigrid McCawley, an attorney for Giuffre, said in a statement, “Her courage pushed me to fight harder, and her strength was awe-inspiring. The world has lost an amazing human being today. Rest in peace, my sweet angel.”
The AP does not identify people who say they were victims of sexual assault unless they have come forward publicly.
Virginia Giuffre, who accused Britain’s Prince Andrew in Epstein sex trafficking scandal, dead at 41
https://arab.news/n8sgz
Virginia Giuffre, who accused Britain’s Prince Andrew in Epstein sex trafficking scandal, dead at 41
- Her publicist confirmed Giuffre died by suicide Friday at her farm in Western Australia
- Giuffre became an advocate for sex trafficking survivors after emerging as a central figure in Epstein’s prolonged downfall
Judge bars federal prosecutors from seeking the death penalty against Luigi Mangione
- Judge Margaret Garnett’s Friday ruling foiled the Trump administration’s bid to see Mangione executed
- Garnett dismissed a federal murder charge against Mangione, finding it technically flawed. She left in place stalking charges that could carry a life sentence
NEW YORK: Federal prosecutors can’t seek the death penalty against Luigi Mangione in the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson, a federal judge ruled Friday, foiling the Trump administration’s bid to see him executed for what it called a “premeditated, cold-blooded assassination that shocked America.”
Judge Margaret Garnett dismissed a federal murder charge that had enabled prosecutors to seek capital punishment, finding it technically flawed. She wrote that she did so to “foreclose the death penalty as an available punishment to be considered by the jury” as it weighs whether to convict Mangione.
Garnett also dismissed a gun charge but left in place stalking charges that carry a maximum punishment of life in prison. To seek the death penalty, prosecutors needed to show that Mangione killed Thompson while committing another “crime of violence.” Stalking doesn’t fit that definition, Garnett wrote in her opinion, citing case law and legal precedents.
In a win for prosecutors, Garnett ruled they can use evidence collected from his backpack during his arrest, including a 9mm handgun and a notebook in which authorities say Mangione described his intent to “wack” an insurance executive. Mangione’s lawyers had sought to exclude those items, arguing the search was illegal because police hadn’t yet obtained a warrant.
During a hearing Friday, Garnett gave prosecutors 30 days to update her on whether they’ll appeal her death penalty decision. A spokesperson for the US attorney’s office in Manhattan, which is prosecuting the federal case, declined to comment.
Garnett acknowledged that the decision “may strike the average person — and indeed many lawyers and judges — as tortured and strange, and the result may seem contrary to our intuitions about the criminal law.” But, she said, it reflected her “committed effort to faithfully apply the dictates of the Supreme Court to the charges in this case. The law must be the Court’s only concern.”
Mangione, 27, appeared relaxed as he sat with his lawyers during the scheduled hearing, which took place about an hour after Garnett issued her written ruling. Prosecutors retained their right to appeal but said they were ready to proceed to trial.
Outside court afterward, Mangione attorney Karen Friedman Agnifilo said her client and his defense team were relieved by the “incredible decision.”
Jury selection in the federal case is set for Sept. 8, followed by opening statements and testimony on Oct. 13. The state trial’s date hasn’t been set. On Wednesday, the Manhattan district attorney’s office urged the judge in that case to schedule a July 1 trial date.
“That case is none of my concern,” Garnett said, adding that she would proceed as if the federal case is the only case unless she hears formally from parties involved in the state case. She also said the federal case will be paused if the government appeals her death penalty ruling.
Thompson, 50, was killed on Dec. 4, 2024, as he walked to a midtown Manhattan hotel for UnitedHealth Group’s annual investor conference. Surveillance video showed a masked gunman shooting him from behind. Police say “delay,” “deny” and “depose” were written on the ammunition, mimicking a phrase used by critics to describe how insurers avoid paying claims.
Mangione, an Ivy League graduate from a wealthy Maryland family, was arrested five days later at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania, about 230 miles (about 370 kilometers) west of Manhattan.
Following through on Trump’s campaign promise to vigorously pursue capital punishment, Attorney General Pam Bondi ordered Manhattan federal prosecutors last April to seek the death penalty against Mangione.
It was the first time the Justice Department sought the death penalty in President Donald Trump’s second term. He returned to office a year ago with a vow to resume federal executions after they were halted under his predecessor, President Joe Biden.
Garnett, a Biden appointee and former Manhattan federal prosecutor, ruled after hearing oral arguments earlier this month.
Besides seeking to have the death penalty rejected on the grounds Garnett cited, Mangione’s lawyers argued that Bondi’s announcement flouted long-established Justice Department protocols and was “based on politics, not merit.”
They said her remarks, followed by posts to her Instagram account and a TV appearance, “indelibly prejudiced” the grand jury process resulting in his indictment weeks later.
Prosecutors urged Garnett to keep the death penalty on the table, arguing that the charges were legally sound and Bondi’s remarks weren’t prejudicial, as “pretrial publicity, even when intense, is not itself a constitutional defect.”
Prosecutors argued that careful questioning of prospective jurors would alleviate the defense’s concerns about their knowledge of the case and ensure Mangione’s rights are respected at trial.
“What the defendant recasts as a constitutional crisis is merely a repackaging of arguments” rejected in previous cases, prosecutors said. “None warrants dismissal of the indictment or categorical preclusion of a congressionally authorized punishment.”
