INTERVIEW
Friday, the police launched a new call for witnesses, international, to find potential victims of Jeffrey Epstein, American billionaire suspected of rape and sexual assault and who committed suicide in his prison cell in the United States this summer . "It was noted that the case was particularly sensitive and complicated," said the microphone of Europe 1 Philippe Guichard, director of the Central Office for the suppression of violence to persons, to investigate in France on this vast file.
An international component "must"
Why is the investigation, opened in a country where Jeffrey Epstein had an apartment and one of his very close, the model agent Jean-Luc Brunel, is also accused of sexual assault, is it so complex? "Firstly because it touches the medium of modeling, which is rather a closed environment," says Philippe Guichard. "And, on the other hand, because there is the international component that is unavoidable: we can very well have facts from a French in the United States or anywhere else that might interest us."
"So we seek, through this call for extended witnesses, to retrieve testimonies or victims who could file on criminal facts of Epstein or his entourage," says the official. "We are almost convinced that the few hearings we have been able to recover from witnesses and victims are just the tree that hides the forest," he says. "They had trouble contacting us because they had trouble identifying us, there is no more trouble because we have a phone number and an email address and they can contact us directly and without intermediary. "
>>> The number and the email address distributed by the French police are the following: +33 683674357 and temoignage-ocrvp@interieur.gouv.fr