‘I’m angry as hell that Epstein is dead’
Celia Walden talks to Lisa Bloom, lawyer for victims
On the August Saturday that Jeffrey Epstein was found dead in his Manhattan jail cell, Lisa Bloom spoke to two of the four victims she is representing. “The first was furious,” says Bloom, the powerhouse civil rights lawyer who represented victims of Bill Cosby and US talk-show host Bill O’reilly, and is now filing a civil case against Epstein’s estate. “It had taken her so many years to feel mature and strong enough to talk to me, and she just really wanted him to face justice – so now she would be deprived of that.
“The other one told me that although she wouldn’t wish death on anybody, it had given her some peace to know that Epstein could never hurt another girl or woman, and that at least she wouldn’t have to fear retribution from him for the civil case that we have now filed.”
Bloom herself says she’s “angry as hell”. The daughter of trailblazing women’s rights lawyer Gloria Allred,
she has spent 33 years representing women against a number of highprofile sexual assaulters and harassers; during the 2016 US presidential election, she offered to help four women with sexual misconduct allegations against Donald Trump. And when I suggest that Epstein – a convicted paedophile and sex-trafficker who was accused of running a “vast network” of under-age girls for sex – appeared to have gamed the system from beyond the grave, the lawyer is in no doubt.
“He clearly did!” exclaims Bloom, an ageless blonde with a gravelly voice who would be dismissed as unfeasibly good-looking were she the star of a legal drama. “With the help of his attorneys. Because we know now that Epstein made a new will two days before he killed himself, and that’s a loud trumpet call that they are likely to try [suicide] again soon. So the lawyers who didn’t alert the jail officials that he should be back on suicide watch really have something to answer for. And I want everybody to know that his criminal case may die with him, but our civil cases can and will proceed against his estate.”
Thanks to Epstein’s new will, which puts
$577 million (£472 million) in assets into a trust fund, making it more difficult for his accusers to collect damages, Bloom accepts that these cases could take years to win. “But we now have 12 women who have come forward, and I’d expect others to because I’m sure there are women out there thinking: ‘I was a victim of Jeffrey Epstein. I’ve never told anyone and I’m so scared.’ Those are the kind of people who call the Bloom Firm every day, and we get them compensation.”
An award of $5-10million is “not at all unusual out here,” she tells me, “but for Jeffrey Epstein’s victims I would expect it to be well in excess of that. And I personally think that every penny of his estate should go to his victims, so I would call upon his beneficiaries to do the right thing: a good thing. Just think how remarkable it would be if they did that.” Philadelphia-born Bloom, 57, is a big believer in the power of compensation. “People will say ‘money doesn’t give them justice’ but actually it does give them a measure of justice,” she insists, adding that abuse “can cause severe lifelong injuries. It can derail people’s careers, relationships and sexualities. And we put numbers on that pain and suffering so that my clients are able to pay off medical bills, get the therapy they often desperately need and maybe even go back to school.” Almost as important is the information that lawyers like Bloom are able to get hold of when filing civil suits. “I have the right to subpoena documents and people. I can force people to come into my law firm and answer questions under oath. And for victims that is also very important. Because some accounts say that Epstein was abusing as many as three girls a day. So how did that happen? Who were all the people involved? And how can we hold them accountable?”
Bloom’s suit alleges that two of her clients were recruited to give Epstein massages, and subsequently assaulted. It also states that at least one “recruiter” – named in the court documents as “Sue Roe” – “was a young woman at the time and may also have been a victim. So our first step was to reach out to her and talk to her and get her to work with us. She’s not the primary target, but there are victims who are also recruiters. It doesn’t make it right, but we do have a little more understanding.”
Bloom has been fighting sexual injustice ever since, at the age of 12, she and her mother staged a protest outside her local drugstore for dividing its toy aisle into “boys” and “girls”, and recently revealed she herself has been a victim of abuse. “I was sexually abused as a child by a family member. I was sexually harassed in the workplace multiple times in multiple places. And sometimes I complained about it and sometimes I didn’t.”
She has risen to prominence in the Metoo era, though in 2017 made headlines for the wrong reasons when she acted as an adviser to Harvey Weinstein, ahead of bombshell reports exposing the media mogul’s alleged decades of sexual harassment and assault. She resigned from the role as soon as the extent of the allegations became clear, and called the decision “a colossal mistake”, despite her explanation that she thought: “Here is my chance to get to the root of the problem from the inside… and get a guy to handle this thing in a different way.”
“In my experience, an apology and a change of behaviour go a long way,” she sighs today. “I thought that was what I was getting him to do but, of course, immediately [after] women began accusing him of sexual assault I realised it was an entirely different situation than I’d thought, and I withdrew. Now I am mortified that I have ever been associated with Weinstein.” She pauses. “But I have represented victims who also had stories that turned out to be very different to what I’d thought. So when you work with human beings, sometimes you’re disappointed.”
Bloom’s firm has an “elaborate process” in order to confirm the veracity of a victim’s claims but, in the legal process, “there are always going to be people who are going to make false accusations”, she concedes. “You’ll never hear me say ‘every woman is right’ and ‘every man is wrong’. I have a husband and a son, men are half of our population – and many of them are very good people.” She is concerned, though, that a culture of “trial by social media” has blossomed since Metoo. “However, we would have less trial by social media if we had a better legal system where women could present claims in an expeditious way. And Metoo was a very powerful moment for the victims. So I hope it continues to build steam.”
She has little patience for those who complain that the post-metoo workplace rules are too constricting. “Other than a handshake, and unless you are a massage therapist, I just don’t think there is ever any need for touching in the workplace. Just as there is never any need to have a meeting in a hotel room.
“But I would also say to women that if you are in a social situation and you go to a guy’s hotel room, 99.9 per cent of the time he will be thinking that you’re going to have sex. So don’t be shocked when he makes a move. Be realistic about what people’s expectations are.”
Another cast-iron rule Bloom has stuck to throughout her career is “only ever have one drink at any kind of professional gathering. And that goes for both sexes”.
Despite this, Bloom does feel that “tremendous cultural progress has been made”. And although she’s under no illusion that the Epstein cases will be “a big fight, we’re up for that fight. And we will not rest until we get the best compensation for our clients – even if it takes years and years.
“So if the other side thinks that they’re going to outlast us,” she warns, with a side smile: “I suggest they look at my track record, because that’s not going to happen.”
‘I am mortified that I have ever been associated with Harvey Weinstein’