‘Nothing I Would Call a Bombshell’: Lawyer For Epstein Accusers Pours Cold Water on New Docs

On Wednesday evening, highly-anticipated documents in the case of Jeffrey Epstein documents were unsealed. The documents contained the names of hundreds of associates of the convicted sex offender who died by suicide in prison in 2019. Despite the hype, the files are hardly the bombshell that many anticipated, an attorney who represented several Epstein accusers told Mediaite in an interview on Thursday.

Arick Fudali, a partner at the Bloom Firm, spoke with Mediaite about the 900-page filing, which was ordered released by a judge in Virginia Giuffre’s now-settled defamation suit against Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell.

Fudali offered his insights on the newly released court filings, what this means for the high profile men that have been identified, which includes Bill Clinton, Prince Andrew, and Donald Trump, and how this impacts his clients.

See excerpts from the conversation below.

On the importance of context

People keep asking me, where is the list? What’s this list? There is no, quote unquote list, as if it’s some sort of black book that Epstein kept of all of his associates and all the people that he provided women to. That is absolutely not what we have.

What it is, is discovery materials, meaning it is deposition transcripts. It’s emails, it’s notes, it’s letters. It’s what we call in the legal world sort of evidence for a case that is finally being unsealed and unredacted by a judge. And within these deposition transcripts, what’s in this, quote unquote, is evidence. You see names, for instance, you know, if someone and Epstein might mention a name in an email, a witness or a victim might mention a name and a, you know, a sworn deposition, that’s what we’re saying. So it’s not a list.

On what the documents revealed

Really nothing I would call a bombshell. It’s a lot of confirmation of names we’ve already heard. You know, certainly it’s different to see names on paper than it is to just have speculation. But, you know, this coverage of Epstein has been so robust for so many years and there’s been so many rumors and, you know, unconfirmed reports of who he associated with and, you know, who he associated with. Nothing is shocking about the names we’ve seen.

Of course, there was a widely publicized lawsuit against Prince Andrew, so there’s nothing shocking there. My understanding is, you know, I think former President Bill Clinton didn’t even object to those documents being released. And he’s made statements about, of course, denying his involvement with Jeffrey Epstein, you know, since the early, early 2000s. So there’s really nothing shocking.

And it’s important for anyone who’s investigated Epstein, like I have for so many years representing so many victims, as I’ve seen he associated himself with really powerful high profile people. And you could argue that Epstein himself was a high profile, powerful person and he would use that power and that influence and use that to control his victims. For instance, when he did invite victims over to his home in New York City, he showed them pictures of him shaking hands with dignitaries and former presidents and very powerful people around the world. And that caused a great fear in the victims to ever speak out against him.

On the importance of closure

Nothing shocked me from these new files. What I would say from the victims’ perspective, though, is there’s always an interest in more exposure and exposing those who are associated with Jeffrey Epstein and exposing more of his crimes and the crimes that Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted of.

On the other side of it, though, the victims are short of some closure. They’ve been suffering for a long time, not just from the abuse, but from the aftermath of the abuse. You know, they were denied their chance at Justice when Jeffrey Epstein killed himself. They were able to get some civil remedy, for the most part from the claim, you know, the Epstein fund that was created after his death, there was some sense of justice when Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted.

But now the more it goes on and on, every time they have to turn on the TV and see Epstein’s face or open the newspaper or open up Twitter and see his name everywhere, you know, it really is counter to the closure they want. From the victims’ perspective, it’s certainly nice to see more and more exposure, but I’m really looking for closure for them. We can finally put an end to this sort of sensationalist coverage, almost this meme-ification of Epstein coverage.

On whether Bill Clinton and others could face legal trouble

Certainly not based on what’s been revealed in these documents. I found nothing in my review of them and the reporting of them that would suggest that Bill Clinton or anyone, any any person who’s been named or associated with Jeffrey Epstein, at least at this point, is going to face any further investigation or any or anything criminal. Beyond just seeing the name on paper, I don’t expect any real ramifications for anyone beyond this, at least on what’s been revealed so far.

On what this means for Epstein’s associates

Honestly I don’t think it changes anything for any of the what we’ll call people who are associated with Jeffrey Epstein or alleged to be associated with Jeffrey Epstein. Nothing in the documents that I’ve reviewed really changes anything significantly other than just actually seeing the names on paper as opposed to just hearing, verbal allegations, hearing rumors, saying things on Twitter. You can actually see the documents with certain names mentioned.

But again, just because you’re an associate of Jeffrey Epstein doesn’t mean you did anything wrong, it doesn’t mean you were a criminal. It’s tough for the public to understand what type of influence Jeffrey Epstein sought and gained with powerful people. That was sort of his scheme. He didn’t just use victims. He used other people in his orbit. He was a real manipulator. And he used his money and his influence to gain powerful, influential friends and then used all that to sort of create this aura and this circle and this scheme of sex trafficking for himself. He sexually abused a lot of women, multiple women for decades. And his power and influence is a big part of that.

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