Epstein Victims' Testimony at Capitol Signifies a Pivotal Moment
In the aftermath of the #MeToo movement, the voices of Jeffrey Epstein's victims are finally being heard. One of these voices belongs to psychologist Annie Farmer, who was just 16 years old when she was allegedly victimized by Epstein and his partner, Ghislaine Maxwell.
Farmer is not alone. In 2005, a woman in Florida discovered that Epstein had given her stepdaughter hundreds of dollars, a red flag that went unnoticed. The question now is whether we will listen to the victims of predators like Epstein and do something about what we hear.
Sadly, many of Epstein's victims dropped out of high school, used drugs, or self-harmed as a result of their experiences. Some, like Virginia Giuffre, have tragically taken their own lives.
Annie Farmer tried to alert law enforcement about her victimization as early as 1996, but nobody listened. She and other victims, aided by pro bono attorneys and allies, refused to stay quiet about their experiences. In 2017, the #MeToo movement amplified the voices of victimized women, leading to a long-overdue expose about Epstein by the Miami Herald in November 2018.
Epstein's criminal activities did not stop with his 2008 plea deal, which allowed him to serve 13 months of an 18-month sentence and granted immunity from further prosecution in southern Florida. In the summer of 2019, Epstein was arrested on multiple new charges and held without bail in New York's Tombs detention center.
Investigators uncovered a vast network of sexually manipulated middle school and high school girls in Palm Beach. The girls were lured to Epstein's house with promises of money for giving him a massage, then coerced into unwanted sex acts. Many of these girls returned repeatedly or were paid to lure in other girls.
Maxwell, Epstein's partner and enabler, is currently serving a 20-year sentence on her conviction for sex-trafficking minors. Ghislaine Maxwell was recently transferred to a minimum-security prison camp in Texas, where her fellow prisoners include Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos.
The Epstein scandal is not about conventional politics or faked suicides, but about money and power being used against the vulnerable and voiceless. Society has historically given men like Epstein a free pass, but this is changing as predators are no longer controlling the telling of the story.
The girls who were victimized by Epstein and Maxwell are finally being heard. Their voices are being amplified, moving the hearts of Americans of every political stripe. It is our duty to ensure that they are not silenced again.
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