It appears that Virginia Giuffre claimed to have been sexually abused/sexually trafficked/a sex slave prior to meeting Maxwell/Epstein. It seems a bit of a coincidence that she should have been abused/pimped out not just by one person but again by more people. How much bad luck and drama can one life have?

Incidentally, judging from books/documentaries about conmen on YouTube, e.g. Hamish McLaren, Mark Acklom (there's a YouTube documentary and an excellent book about him by one of his victims: "Sleeping with a Psychopath" by Carolyn Woods), drama seems to form a big part of the backstories they tell their marks.

Perversion of Justice: Even from jail, sex abuser manipulated the system. His victims were kept in the dark

... At 11, she says, she was sexually molested by a family friend. At 12, she was smoking pot and skipping school. At 13, she was in and out of foster homes, and at 14, she was on the street.

In Miami, the runaway became a captive of a 65-year-old sex trafficker, Ron Eppinger. For months, she says, she was sexually abused, kept in an apartment and pimped out to pedophiles. After his indictment in 2000 on trafficking charges, Roberts returned to West Palm Beach and tried to heal.

That summer, when Roberts was 16, she said her father helped her get a job as a locker room attendant at the spa at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, records show. Her father worked at the resort as a maintenance man. ...

Plaything of perverts... and a Prince: NIGEL CAWTHORNE takes a forensic look at the abuse suffered by Virginia Roberts - the ex-sex slave Prince Andrew just paid £12m - in a new book with details that make the Duke's behaviour all the more repugnant

...Virginia remembers sitting on a kerb one day and weeping. She was 13 years old and hadn't eaten in three days. Just then, a black stretch limousine pulled up and the back door opened.

A fat, balding man, who was accompanied by a striking young blonde, asked her: 'What is such a sweet little girl like you doing sitting alone on the street looking so upset?'

Although she was suspicious, at least these strangers were showing some concern. So Virginia told them she was very hungry, hoping the man would give her money for food. Instead, he invited her into the car so they could talk some more. She got in.

The man introduced himself as Ron Eppinger, owner of the modelling agency Perfect 10. It was, in fact, a front for international sex trafficking....
Apart from articles referring to Giuffre and Eppinger, this is the only information about Ronald Eppinger - who according to the Nigel Cawthorne article above died in jail - I can find:

www.muckrock.com/foi/united-states-of-am...investigation-78970/

Check out the backstory to Peter Saunders (NAPAC) Jo, especially that uncovered by Spirit of Savile.

Ah, yes, Saunders' story seems to have had plenty of drama too.

...The Huffington Post gives a potted biography of Peter Saunders:

"Pete Saunders is an adult survivor of childhood abuse. He was abused by the head teacher of his primary school, a family member and two priests at his secondary school. ..."

Bloody hell I thought, He didn’t have a lot of luck as a child, sounded something of an understatement! Head teacher, a family member and two priests!! Jesus Christ......Then I noticed that last year Mr.Saunders was interviewed, and the first glitch appeared to arise. ...

jimcannotfixthis.blogspot.com/2013/06/th...tence-of-memory.html

Moor Larkin's/Spirit of Savile's examination of Saunders' inconsistent claims and morphing story is very interesting.

Regarding Virginia Giuffre's claims about her experience with Ronald Eppinger, I wonder whether they have been independently verified. The fact that most of the information online referring to him also seems to be in reference to her alleged involvement with him makes me wonder if the writers have used her as the source. If Eppinger pleaded guilty to smuggling women into the country to work as prostitutes, why would he have gone to that effort if he could use local girls like Giuffre - assuming that he did use local girls. If he was abusing and pimping out Giuffre as an under-age girl, why does he appear (judging from the muckrock link) not to have been prosecuted for that?

Sad truth is no-one needs to be 'trafficked' into the USA where there are 100,000s of runaways.

She's milking this for all it's worth..so nice for her children.

No-one was ever convicted over Saunder's alleged abuse.

Yes indeed and it's worth noting that there was no prosecution or conviction of Peter Saunders (NAPAC) either - but he admitted his abuse, felt shame and blamed the victim in his police interview (copyright The Vatican).

hedda wrote:
Sad truth is no-one needs to be 'trafficked' into the USA where there are 100,000s of runaways.

She's milking this for all it's worth..so nice for her children.

No-one was ever convicted over Saunder's alleged abuse.
Given that she's now saying she "may have made a mistake" over claiming to have had sex with Alan Dershowitz "at least six times", I wonder how much of the dramatic backstory (abused by family friend, runaway, fostered, lived on streets, abused/pimped out by Eppinger, etc.) is actually true and whether the journalists who have reported it have only used her as their source.

More drama from the Cawthorne article:

At 6am one morning, an FBI SWAT team burst in, dressed in black with helmets, visors and rifles. It was over. Eppinger fled to the Czech Republic but was later extradited to stand trial on charges of smuggling aliens for prostitution, interstate travel for the purposes of prostitution and money laundering. He died in jail.
So the FBI apparently didn't have a problem with finding an abused underage girl on the premises. Could she have made the whole thing up, e.g. saw reports in the media about Eppinger and decided to insert herself into the story?