Ehud Barak implicated in Epstein court filings

Former prime minister Ehud Barak responded to a report filed by the Miami Herald, claiming that Barak was mentioned in sealed court documents which alleged he was sexually involved with a minor in relation to the late financier Jeffrey Epstein.

“Barak’s name was inserted into the article in order to push aside the allegations against Dershowitz,” Barak said in a statement, according to N12. “In Dershowitz’s paper it’s stated that the women’s testimony is false. Barak does not comment on imaginary rumors or false affidavits. Moreover, neither did Barak know nor did he meet Epstein in 2002, when the women supposedly left the US for Australia.”

Sealed depositions from a 2016 defamation suit filed by Virginia Giuffre, one of the purported victims of Epstein’s sex trafficking ring, against Ghislaine Maxwell, an associate and alleged madam of Jeffrey Epstein, were obtained by the legal team of lawyer Alan Dershowitz. And, according to the Herald, Barak was named within the confidential documents as one of the people the plaintiff was trafficked to and forced to have sex with.

The sealed depositions were obtained by the outspoken Harvard professor in connection to a separate 2019 civil defamation lawsuit filed by the same plaintiff, who alleges she was forced to have sex with Dershowitz while working as a locker room attendant at US President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort. Dershowitz in response countersued for defamation.

Giuffre’s lawyers were attempting to keep the documents sealed, according to the Herald report, because they were worried that Dershowitz might twist the information to use in his favor. However, his lawyer Howard Cooper admitted in court Tuesday they procured some of the confidential affidavits, where Giuffre named Barak as one of her offenders.

Epstein, a wealthy 66-year-old money manager, was arrested in July of last year and pleaded not guilty to sex trafficking charges involving women and girls as young as 14 from 2002 to 2005 throughout Manhattan and Florida.

He died August 10, two days after signing his will, by apparently hanging himself in his cell.

Reuters contributed to this report.