Ghislaine ‘victim’: I was on Epstein jet with Andrew

Maxwell’s ‘life of luxury as Epstein’s 2nd in command’

A FORMER schoolgirl victim of paedophile Jeffrey Epstein told a court yesterday that she flew on one of the pervert’s private jets with Prince Andrew.

‘Jane’, as she has been named in the court in New York, also told how Epstein drove her to meet Donald Trump at the future President’s Florida resort when she was just 14 years old.

On her second day on the witness stand at Ghislaine Maxwell’s sex trafficking trial, Jane, now 41, recalled her encounter with the Duke of York.

It was the second time Andrew’s name has been brought into the case in its first three days – both times by lawyers acting for his friend Maxwell.

Epstein owned a fleet of luxury jets, including one known as the ‘Lolita Express’ due to the claims he used it to transport teenagers around the world for sex abuse. It was not explained in court if this was the plane Andrew was said to be travelling on with Jane.

Yesterday the witness was asked if she remembered being on flights with ‘a number of individuals’.

Laura Menninger, for Maxwell, asked Jane ‘Do you remember Prince Andrew being on a flight?’ – to which she replied: ‘Yes.’

There is no suggestion of any wrongdoing on Andrew’s behalf.

Jane claims she was groomed and sexually abused by Epstein and Maxwell from the ages of 14 to 16, after being lured in by the ‘dangerous predator’ British socialite who forced her to take part in sordid orgies.

Jane told the court how Epstein had driven her to Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in 1994. She had taken part in a Miss Teen pageant that involved Mr Trump in the 1990s.

There is no accusation Mr Trump did anything wrong or knew of Epstein’s crimes.

Maxwell, 59, who denies all six charges of child sex trafficking, stared intently at Jane as she gave her evidence. Maxwell’s brother Kevin was in the public gallery, for the first time, alongside their sister Isabel.

Asked later if he had any comment about his sister, Mr Maxwell told the Mail: ‘Only that I’m here to support her.’

Maxwell, wearing a charcoal sweater and black trousers, had earlier shown her lawyer an A4 page of scribbled notes and spent a few minutes whispering in Miss Menninger’s ear as she prepared to start cross-examining Jane about her claims of abuse.

The alleged victim, an actress on a soap opera for the past 20 years, was accused of making up her memories of abuse and was painted as a money-grabbing liar using her acting skills. She was accused yesterday of being able to ‘cry on command’.

The court heard she had made a compensation claim against the estate of the late Epstein, who killed himself in 2019, and had been offered £4million.

She had also launched a damages claim against Maxwell and overall was said to have demanded nearly £19million for the abuse she suffered.

Yesterday it was repeatedly put to her that she had changed her story to insert Maxwell into her claims – having previously only told the FBI and her own family about Epstein’s abuse.

Miss Menninger said that during a December 2019 interview with FBI agents, Jane had said she could not remember a specific first time she had sex with Maxwell. But on Tuesday, she gave jurors a vivid account of Maxwell and Epstein ‘fondling’ her and each other in the bedroom of his Palm Beach home.

Maxwell’s lawyer said: ‘You came up with that memory in the last two years? The one you told the jury yesterday?’ Jane replied: ‘I don’t believe I came up with a memory, no.’

Miss Menninger said Jane had told the FBI she had ‘no memory of Ghislaine being present when Epstein engaged in any sexual contact’ with her. Jane said: ‘I don’t recall’ – an answer she gave to dozens of questions.

She gave the same response when asked if she remembered telling the FBI two years ago that she ‘wasn’t sure’ if Maxwell had touched her – having told the jury this week Maxwell had groped her breasts.

Miss Menninger accused her of boosting her story, saying: ‘You went from “nothing inappropriate happened” to being abused 90 per cent of the time.’

Referring to an alleged incident in New York, she told the witness: ‘Today you remember it – in 2020 you do not.’

Jane is the first of four victims of Epstein to testify against Maxwell, the daughter of the late tycoon Robert, claiming she preyed on them and ‘facilitated’ the abuse by Epstein, which Maxwell denies.

Further questioned by the prosecutor, Jane wiped away tears when asked about criticism from Maxwell’s side of her £4million settlement with the Epstein victims’ fund. She said: ‘I wish I had never received that

‘Most shameful, deepest secrets’

‘My life would change for ever’

money in the first place because of what happened.’

She explained discrepancies with her account to the FBI by saying: ‘I was standing in a roomful of strangers and telling them the most shameful, deepest secrets that I’ve been carrying around with me my whole life.’

Jane said she remembered the first time Epstein sexually abused her more clearly than other events, ‘because it’s the beginning of when my life would change forever’.

Asked by the prosecutor about the difference between acting and testifying, she said: ‘Acting on TV is not real, and testifying in court is.’ The case continues.

GHISLAINE Maxwell’s life of opulence as Jeffrey Epstein’s ‘second-in-command’ was laid bare in court yesterday.

Jurors in the 59-year-old British socialite’s trial were shown never-before-seen photographs of paedophile Epstein’s £60million fleet of jets, which he allegedly used to shuttle teenage girls between his lavish homes.

Prosecutors allege the planes flew between his private Caribbean island, New Mexico ranch, New York City townhouse and an 8,600 sq ft Parisian apartment near the Arc de Triomphe.

The travel was arranged by an array of personal assistants, including Sarah Kellen, with several pictures of her shown to the jury.

One showed a young Miss Kellen standing in front of a twin-engine Cessna 421 with Epstein embracing her from behind and kissing her head. More recent pictures showed her smiling for the camera in the Caribbean.

Epstein’s chief pilot Larry Visoski told the court in New York: ‘[Epstein] had an array of personal assistants, almost like professional shoppers, because there was a lot of items that needed to be purchased for all of the properties that were being acquired.’

He named Miss Kellen, now 42, as the person he spoke to most about scheduling flights. The court heard the pair spoke so often, the pilot had her number on speed dial.

Miss Kellen has previously been described as Maxwell’s ‘lieutenant’ in Epstein’s circle of abuse and has been accused of playing a pivotal role in the scandal, helping to procure young girls.

She has been named as the chief fixer who travelled the world with Epstein and was accused by lawyers in legal filings of ‘bringing girls to Epstein’s mansion to be abused’.

Miss Kellen was said to have had a ‘Rolodex’ of women she would call for massages at Epstein’s mansion in Palm Beach, Florida.

A 2008 deal by Epstein with the US authorities, after he pleaded guilty to procuring a child for sex, saw him strike an agreement protecting his unindicted alleged coconspirators. Among the four given future immunity was Miss Kellen, who went on to run her own business after leaving Epstein’s employment, but from one of his properties in New York.

She later reinvented herself as ‘Sarah Kensington’, and became an interior designer who boasts of renovating corporate apartments in New York, the Caribbean and Paris.

On her interior design website in 2015, she described being ‘fortunate to say that I’ve been able to travel to many locations around the world, which in turn has broadened my designing skills’.

But in an interview last year, Miss Kellen, who is married to American racing car driver Brian Vickers, insisted: ‘I’m no monster.’

When approached outside her £3.4million New York home, she claimed she was a victim, saying:

‘I’m a victim of Jeffrey Epstein’

‘I’ve been made out to be such a monster – but it’s not true. I’m a victim of Jeffrey Epstein. I was raped and abused weekly.’

The photographs of Miss Kellen were part of a batch entered into evidence which reveals the life of luxury Maxwell led as Epstein’s closest confidante. Epstein had a Hawker Siddeley 125, a Gulfstream G2B, a helicopter and a Boeing 727 dubbed the ‘Lolita Express’ amid claims he used it to fly underage girls around the world.

That plane, which is more than 130ft long, was fitted with an office

dubbed ‘the red room’ because of its furniture, a master bedroom with a queen-sized bed, a lounge area with a large round sofa, and a ‘full decked-out’ kitchen.

The jury were also shown pictures of Epstein’s £164 million property empire, including Little St James, his private island in the US Virgin Islands, worth around £50million. Epstein also owned the neighbouring island, Great St James, which is valued at £14 million, while he had a £12 million mansion in Florida. Other properties included an 8,000-acre, £21 million ranch in New Mexico, a £10 million Paris apartment, and a £57million seven-storey townhouse on New York’s Upper East Side.