French modelling agent Jean‑Luc Brunel was at one point prepared to cooperate with U.S. prosecutors and share what he knew aboutJeffrey Epstein’s sex-trafficking network, according to newly released U.S. Justice Department files cited in an exclusive report by The Wall Street Journal. Documents indicate that in 2016 Brunel quietly entered discussions with lawyers representing Epstein’s victims. His attorney reportedly told them Brunel had recruited girls for Epstein and possessed potentially incriminating photographs. Talks advanced to the point where a date was discussed for Brunel to meet prosecutors at the U.S. Attorney’s office in New York in exchange for immunity.
Handwritten notes from a federal prosecutor dated February 2016 stated, "One of Epstein’s bfs, Jean Luc Brunel, has helped get girls. He is wanting to cooperate… Brunel is afraid of being prosecuted.”
The files suggest Epstein learned of these negotiations. On May 3, 2016, he emailed attorney Kathy Ruemmler warning that Brunel planned to approach prosecutors the following week and that an associate had requested “3 million dollars so that Jean Luc would not go in.” Epstein wrote that Brunel feared arrest if he failed to cooperate and asked for more information, while also dismissing Brunel’s lawyer and friend as “scammers.”
Ruemmler replied hours later, asking Epstein to call. The next day she wrote, "Awake now. Talking to Poe in 20 mins.” Gregory Poe was one of Epstein’s lawyers in Washington at the time.
It remains unclear why Brunel ultimately chose not to cooperate. He never met prosecutors and Epstein remained free for three more years until his 2019 arrest. Epstein later died in a New York jail in what authorities ruled a suicide.
After Brunel withdrew from negotiations, prosecutors did not immediately pursue charges against him. “It set us back a couple of years,” said victims’ attorney David Boies, noting that more than 50 additional girls were allegedly trafficked during the period that followed.
Brunel occupied a central role in Epstein’s circle, running a modeling agency that prosecutors believe was used to recruit foreign girls and young women. He travelled frequently on Epstein’s private jet, visited his private island and exchanged extensive emails with him.
Notes in the Justice Department files show that federal prosecutors in New York were briefed in 2016 on Epstein’s alleged trafficking network and on the roles of Brunel, Ghislaine Maxwell and others in recruiting underage girls. Yet Epstein was not arrested until 2019, after renewed scrutiny sparked by a 2018 investigation by the Miami Herald.
Joseph Titone, Brunel’s lawyer, told the Journal he had urged his client to cooperate and cut ties with Epstein. “I recommended and advised him to stop communicating with Epstein, but he never did,” Titone said.
Brunel was arrested in France in 2020 on allegations including rape and supplying girls to Epstein. He died in a Paris jail in 2022. Maxwell was convicted in 2021 and is serving a 20-year sentence.
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