Jeffrey Epstein associate was trailed by sordid allegations for decades. Cops ignored it
Then and now, Glaucia Fekete thought the proposition strange. Leave her home in the south of Brazil to participate in a modeling show in faraway Ecuador, and you’ll be named the winner.
She said the offer came in 2004 from Jean-Luc Brunel, a French modeling mogul with offices then in Miami Beach. He was detained in Paris this past week and formally charged on Friday, after decades of allegations that he raped and trafficked aspiring models, at times introducing them to his close friend Jeffrey Epstein. The charges involve sexual harassment and the rape of minors over 15 years old.
Fekete was 16, a high school student back in 2004, and the idea of a jaunt to Ecuador was not popular with her strict family in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil’s southernmost state and a recruiting ground for supermodels of German descent such as Gisele Bündchen. Brunel even visited Fekete’s family and that of other models.
She was allowed to go but with her family doctor as her chaperone, something that almost two decades later she thinks protected her from the alleged behavior for which Brunel stands accused.
“Because people were dumb, they were easily tricked with these offers,” Fekete said, adding later that, “We didn’t question it. At 17 years old you don’t think about it, you just go and do it.”
Brunel’s girlfriend at the time, and the girlfriend’s posse, were all minors, she said.
In 1988, Diane Sawyer on “60 Minutes” broadcast a blistering portrait of how young women and girls were lured from the United States to France, then plied with drugs and coerced into sex as part of the price of admission into big-time modeling. While it acknowledged varying cultural views toward sex and differing ages, “American Girls in Paris,” cast an ugly spotlight on two modeling agents, one of them now deceased, one of them Brunel.
“Back in the day, everyone was underaged you know; there wasn’t one who wasn’t,” said Fekete, recalling Brunel’s girlfriend staying with him in Ecuador. “I remember that she lied to us that she was 21 but after a while her true age was revealed.”
Fekete doesn’t recall seeing him, but flight records show Epstein flew to Guayaquil on Aug. 24, and departed the next day, which was when the contest was held. The logs also show that longtime Epstein associate Ghislaine Maxwell was on the flight.
Cordula Pfluegl also competed at the Brunel-sponsored event in the coastal city and like Fekete remembers years later that there was something off about the diminutive, charismatic Brunel.
“He had something weird about him and he was very touchy with everyone,” Pfluegl said in a phone interview from the Netherlands, where she’s director of a company called Future Females Europe. “He had almost an entourage of three or four Brazilian models with his [Brazilian] girlfriend. It was obvious he loved touching everyone and being around a lot of women and girls.”
The runway extravaganza in August 2004 featured contestants from around the world, many from Eastern Europe and Brazil. Fekete, who spoke by phone from her home in the city of Bento Gonçalves, shared pictures of the other girls from her scrapbook.
As it happened, despite the promised victory for Fekete, another Brazilian won. And in light of what the world now knows of Brunel’s good friend and former business associate Epstein, Pfluegl now recalls that many of the contestants sought by Brunel were from poorer backgrounds.
“Looking back now, it’s obvious some of us were much more of a target,” she said, alluding to the girls from poorer backgrounds. “You could see this was going to be easier to get these girls to do certain things.”
That abusive behavior took place in the modeling world is hardly a secret. But what distinguishes Brunel is his longevity in the field, and the time span over which alleged abuses occurred. His detention raises the possibility that, like his close friend Epstein, a man who was connected, rich and powerful might be held to account for alleged sexual abuse of aspiring models, many of them minors.
Epstein was arrested in July 2019, and found dead in his jail cell in August of that year in what was determined to be a suicide. After Epstein’s death, French authorities quickly opened an investigation, but it took them weeks to finally raid his luxurious 8,000-square-foot Parisian residence on Aug. 23 of that year. They also searched the offices of Karin Models, Brunel’s former agency.
Sources close to the French investigation said at least four women have come forward to accuse Brunel of rape or sexual assault — allegations he “strongly denied” through his lawyer, Corinne Dreyfus-Schmidt.
But because the alleged crimes happened so long ago, the case wasn’t deemed strong enough at the time to force him to testify, even with more recent accusations reported in France of sexual harassment of a minor, a babysitter hired by Brunel.
The case seemed frozen until Brunel was detained at Charles de Gaulle airport on Wednesday while preparing to fly to Senegal.
Low Friends, High Places?
Like Epstein, Brunel had friends in high places. His accusers said the top echelon of France’s leadership class partied with him along the French Riviera. An American model, Heather Braden, insists she saw her off-and-on-again agent Brunel with Epstein and then-New York developer Donald J. Trump together at parties at least 10 times in the early 1990s.
Models from Brunel’s Miami Beach-based agency, MC2, were known to socialize at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago.
The White House declined to discuss Brunel or what President Trump remembers of him.
And then there are the gregarious photos of Brunel and Maxwell, Epstein’s alleged co-conspirator in sexual abuse of minors. The photos suggest Brunel enjoyed an inner-circle connection to Epstein and Maxwell, who since last July has been jailed in New York awaiting trial this coming summer for her role in allegedly procuring minors for Epstein.
Maxwell denied in a recently unsealed April 2016 deposition that she had any knowledge of Brunel supplying Epstein with underage girls. She was asked specifically about a message on a notepad indicating that Brunel had called about a Russian “teacher” who was “two times eight years old,” which is believed to be code for 16. Maxwell denied seeing a 16-year-old Russian girl in Epstein’s home
The deposition came in a defamation suit brought against Maxwell by Epstein accuser Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who said that Epstein and Maxwell directed her to have sex with numerous powerful men, including Brunel. Giuffre said in a filing in the case that Brunel provided girls, some as young as 12, to have sex with Epstein. Though Brunel seldom speaks in public, he has twice issued denials of wrongdoing, in 2015 and 2019.
Through a spokeswoman, Giuffre said she was “very pleased” with the arrest of Brunel. “On behalf of all of his victims, I hope justice will be served for his horrific crimes against the young and innocent.”
Brunel’s arrest could have implications in the United States. where federal prosecutors in New York are building a case against Maxwell and other people suspected of involvement in Epstein’s sex trafficking operation. U.S. Justice Department officials were mum on any connection to cases stateside.
“There is no doubt that the Department of Justice and the FBI will request to talk to Brunel, and I hope that any kind of plea agreement would include a provision that he share what he knows,’‘ said Francey Hakes, a former federal prosecutor who served as national coordinator for DOJ’s child exploitation unit. “When it comes to sex crimes, law enforcement around the world have a very collaborative relationship, especially when the crimes involve minors. Those conversations are happening.’‘
A European woman who agreed to be interviewed on the condition that she remain anonymous said that when she was 24 in the early 2000s and working as a model for Karin Models in New York, Brunel — whom she barely knew — recruited her for Epstein.
The model had been planning to return home to attend college, but Brunel convinced her that she should stay in New York and that his friend Epstein would pay for her college education as an act of “philanthropy.”
“I have a very good friend of mine, he’s very wealthy and very good-hearted,” the woman recalled Brunel saying. “He knows nothing better than spending his money on good causes.”
Instead, Epstein raped her soon after they met and tried to control her life, she recounted, including trying to alienate her from her family.
When she finally challenged Epstein’s demands, he immediately cut ties with her and she started receiving ominous phone calls that she believes were orchestrated by Epstein. Ultimately, she left New York, fearing for her life.
“He assaulted me and he made me a bigger mess than I already was,” she said. “The trauma that I’m left with was more damaging than the physical rape.”
Her story was supported by public records and interviews with a friend with whom she had confided at the time. The woman has applied for compensation under a special Epstein Victims Compensation Fund, created as part of the settlement of his estate. The fund began operating in June.
McClatchy, the Miami Herald and the French daily 20 Minutes had been working together for months on a joint investigative report into Brunel. The collaboration included interviews with numerous women across the globe who shared stories about Brunel and Epstein.
Brunel’s surprise detention in Paris on Wednesday, announced by French authorities a day later, led the reporting partners to tell the victims’ stories now.
Crime suspects in France are arrested first, and then investigated. If the evidence shows a crime was committed, then the suspect is charged. The case was opened by French authorities last year in connection with allegations that had surfaced abroad and in the United States into Brunel’s relationship with Epstein. The inquiry has focused on Epstein’s residence on the Avenue Foch in Paris, where he allegedly abused women and minors, possibly with the help of Brunel.
No U.S. criminal charges have been filed against Brunel, but federal prosecutors are interested in speaking to him, several sources told the Herald. The FBI has attachés in France who are likely working with French authorities.
There is no extradition treaty with France, so it is unlikely that Brunel will ever face charges in this country.
“There is about zero chance of France giving him to the U.S. for prosecution,’’ said Hakes, who pointed to the case of film director Roman Polanski, who was found guilty of drugging and raping a 13-year-old girl in the United States but fled in 1977 while awaiting sentencing. He remains a fugitive, living in France, which has refused to extradite him.
Brunel’s arrest, as well as the February arrest of another high-profile French writer accused of pedophilia, Gabriel Matzneff, suggests that France’s attitudes about sex, especially involving children, have been upended.
“The Epstein story dropped a bomb on public consciousness, and that coupled with the #MeToo movement ... has led to a global movement, even in France that traditionally had a more permissible view of sex,’’ Hakes said.
“Frankly, it’s because women have stood up for themselves and enough women in power, influence and authority are all speaking with one voice to say ‘we are no longer going to be harassed, attacked or forgotten.’’’
Modeling Scout’s Accusers
Thysia Huisman was a 17-year-old aspiring model when her Belgian agent sent her in 1991 to live with Brunel in Paris. He eventually raped her, she said, and she abandoned hopes of a modeling career.
“After I was raped by Brunel, I took the first train out of Paris. I went back to Brussels where I lived,” she recalled in a telephone interview, adding she soon returned to her native Netherlands, got a college degree and went to work in television.
“It is still very painful. I was 18, and I was in the hands of a predator — I didn’t stand a chance,” said Huisman, now 46.
She kept her story to herself for a long time. Three years after her alleged rape, Brunel moved to New York, became a partner in Karin Models, and with Epstein’s help would go on to launch MC2 on Miami Beach.
Years later, Huisman searched the internet for Brunel’s name, and found it was now associated with Epstein and the financier’s deal that resulted in a conviction and light sentence in 2008 for solicitation of prostitution from a minor. That deal was also the focus of the Herald’s Perversion of Justice series in November 2018, which renewed attention on Epstein.
“I tried to contact him, just to speak to him. But he was kind of like a ghost. That was three years ago,” Huisman said earlier this year, noting she then told her story about Brunel to French police and not long afterward to journalists.
Zoë Brock said she was 17 when she left New Zealand to pursue a modeling career in Paris and was placed in Brunel’s house in 1991. It didn’t take long until she was brought to parties on the French coastline with top politicians and celebrities.
“Jean-Luc is very well connected, much like Epstein,” she said. “I think there are people protecting Jean-Luc like there were people protecting Jeffrey Epstein.”
When Brock rebuffed his sexual advances, she was sent to a small apartment in an area of Paris infamous for prostitution. She said she was one of six young models crammed into the tiny apartment. “I found out years later that he told all the agencies in Europe … that I was a cocaine addict. He sabotaged my career.”
Carla, not her real name, was another model who overlapped with Brock and Brunel in Paris in 1991 and said she was not as fortunate to escape abuse. She spoke on the condition of anonymity because she has a family she wants to protect. Carla said she left the United States to work with Brunel’s agency at the age of 16 and initially lived with Brunel and his then-wife, Roberta, in a beautiful apartment near the famed Avenue des Champs-Élysées. It was complete with gilded ceilings and a butler.
“You feel very special. … They obviously believe in you if they put you in that position,” said Carla, who had never spoken with a reporter about Brunel.
Brunel frequently had men over, most in their 50s and 60s, and he would make her model for them in his wife’s clothing, she said, before whisking her off with them to a nightclub.
“What are you supposed to do? In those times, there was no cellular phone, no way of calling your mom and asking if this was a good idea,” Carla said in a series of interviews that ended abruptly when reliving an unwanted sexual act proved too painful. “You feel molested by the whole city.”
Like Epstein, Brunel was reportedly fond of massages and back rubs, his entrée into more nefarious activity. On a modeling assignment in Spain, Brunel allegedly sought more than just a massage from Carla. When she rebuffed him, she said, he tossed her out and sent her to live with five other young women, forcing her to pay rent and meals. The innuendo and sexual harassment did not stop.
“You become more and more isolated and indebted to these powerful people, and the one at the top is going to pressure you,” Carla recalled, adding that “as you look at it in retrospect, you realize there is the grooming and all the things that set you up so a powerful person can take advantage of you.”
Heather Braden said she worked with Brunel off and on in the 1990s and tells a similar story of alleged grooming and sexual pressure from Brunel.
“Me personally, this guy was the shadow and ghost in my life. He tried it with me and all of my friends,” said Braden, now in her 40s and still an active model and photographer writing her memoir. “I had more hustle in me than they did, but I saw them systematically tear apart girls’ lives. This whole industry got away with raping girls and destroying them for 40 years, and the number one person I can tie to everything who is still around is Jean-Luc.”
A self-described Epstein victim who came forward recently to McClatchy and the Miami Herald earlier this year to tell of abuse that happened until just months before his jail-cell death in August 2019 recalled seeing Brunel on Epstein’s infamous estate in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Insisting on anonymity because she did not want to subject her European family, which did business with Epstein, to publicity, the woman said Brunel had been on Little St. James Island with Epstein in the past two years but came in on his own and not on Epstein’s private jet.
It was an important detail, because roughly 15 years ago the models competing in Ecuador were talking about the island.
“All of the Brazilian girls talked about ‘the island,’” said Pfluegl, the contestant in Ecuador in 2004, who now sees the time with Brunel and his behavior with more clarity. “I think you kind of had a feeling, or knew, but on purpose you looked away. Everyone knew. … People did know that but downplayed it.”
McClatchy White House Correspondent Michael Wilner contributed.
EDITOR’S NOTE: McClatchy, the Miami Herald and the French national daily 20 Minutes have been collaborating on an investigation into Brunel and are reporting the story jointly.
This story was originally published December 18, 2020 at 9:29 AM with the headline "Jeffrey Epstein associate was trailed by sordid allegations for decades. Cops ignored it."
