Paris (AFP)

The Paris prosecutor's office opened Friday an investigation for "rape" and "sexual assault", including on minors, in the case of the US financier Jeffrey Epstein, already sued in the United States before his death in prison, a month after being alerted about potential French victims.

The investigations should make it possible to "expose any offenses committed not only on the national territory, but also abroad to the detriment of French victims" as well as any "authors of French nationality", explained in a statement the Paris prosecutor, Rémy Heitz.

This investigation was also opened for "criminal conspiracy to commit crimes" and "criminal conspiracy to commit crimes punishable by at least 5 years imprisonment," he said.

He added that the prosecution had made its decision after "checks and cross-checks on the basis of the elements" that had been transmitted to it and "exchanges" with the competent US authorities.

The association Innocence in danger, which had sent a report to the prosecutor at the end of July and then called in an open letter, two days after the death of Epstein, to open an investigation, welcomed this announcement.

In a statement, it indicated that it would reserve "to the judicial authority the content of the information and testimonies of which it was made address in the last weeks".

Thursday, this association of protection of the childhood had affirmed to have received ten testimonys emanating mainly from victims of acts "committed on the French soil" in connection with the multimillionaire died at the age of 66 years, which had an apartment in Paris and went regularly to France.

In the government, state secretaries Marlène Schiappa (Equality between men and women) and Adrien Taquet (Child Protection) had called for the opening of an investigation in France, two days after the suicide by hanging the financier in his New York cell on August 10th.

Epstein was arrested on 6 July and charged in New York with organizing, from 2002 to 2005 at least, a network of dozens of girls, some college girls, with whom he would have had forced sex in his many properties, including in Manhattan and Florida.

- "Birthday present" -

In a testimony dating from 2011 but recently made public in the United States, a plaintiff already accused the financier and jet-setter of having abused very young French women who had been sent to her as a "surprise birthday present".

According to Anglo-Saxon media, she also assured that these girls had been sent to the United States by a former close friend of Epstein, the French Jean-Luc Brunel.

The name of Mr. Brunel, founder of modeling agencies Karin Models and MC2 Model Management, appeared at the first investigation opened in the United States against Epstein and closed in 2007, after which the financier pleaded guilty to soliciting prostitutes . He was then sentenced to 13 months in prison.

According to two complainants, Brunel played the role of re-seller for Epstein, bringing to the United States "girls" from modest backgrounds by dangling jobs in modeling.

At the time, disturbing messages were found by the Florida police, including this one, noted in 2005 after a phone call from "Jean-Luc": "He has a teacher for you, to teach you to speak She's 2x8 years old, not blond. "

Virginia Giuffre, one of the main plaintiffs in the Epstein case, also claimed to have been forced to have sex with Mr. Brunel.

In 2015, then cold with Epstein, Mr. Brunel had announced actions in France and the United States to denounce these "allegations" but none of these procedures has flourished.

Today disappeared from radar, the septuagenarian was however seen in early July in an upscale evening near Paris.

© 2019 AFP