Banks used by Jeffrey Epstein can be sued for sex trafficking, says court. A federal court says that sex-trafficking lawsuits against JPMorgan Chase and Deutsche Bank can go forward. In three separate but similar suits, the two banks are being accused of knowingly benefiting from sex trafficking by allowing Jeffrey Epstein—who killed himself in prison while awaiting a federal trial on charges of sex trafficking minors—to bank with them.
The plaintiffs—which include Epstein accusers and the government of the Virgin Islands, where Epstein had a private island—say the banks should have dropped or rejected Epstein when he was accused of or plead guilty to sex crimes. Epstein was a client of JPMorgan from 1998 through 2013 and became a client of Deutsche Bank in 2013. In 2008, Epstein pleaded guilty in Florida to soliciting a minor for prostitution. He was later accused of sex crimes involving 40 girls, but died before the resolution of that case.
