The Rally - Ghislaine Maxwell Trial, Weekend
“Don’t Forget! Epstein’s ‘Clients’ Are Sex Traffickers, Too…”
About a hundred people rallied in Thomas Paine Park from 1:00 to 3:00PM on Saturday afternoon, across the street from the Thurgood Marshall Courthouse where federal prosecutors are trying Ghislaine Maxwell for sex trafficking of a minor.
At the rally, survivors and activists spoke about the need to prosecute all abusers that Maxwell and Epstein trafficked victims to. The rally was organized by survivors and supported by a variety of organizations fighting sex trafficking and providing support to victims of sexual violence.
“We want to send the message to the rally that traffickers need to be held accountable, they need to be brought to justice, and it was important to start with Epstein and then with Maxwell, but we shouldn’t be ending with these two individuals,” said Lorie Cohen, CEO of the anti-child-sex-trafficking group ECPAT-USA. “This was part of a larger group of individuals that exploited girls and teenagers. Everybody connected to this needs to be held accountable, including the people who purchased those girls.”
“We’re here to support the survivors of Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein,” said Taina Bien-Aimé, the Executive Director of the Coalition Against Trafficking in Women. Bien-Aimé is also a member of New York City’s Commission for Gender Equity.
Her organization advocates for legislation that decriminalizes individuals involved in prostitution, but also calls for the prosecution of perpetrators, including sex buyers.
“Because sex buyers are the essence of the sex trade, right?” said Bien-Aimé. “Without sex buyers there waiting to consume prostitution, there would be no sex traffickers.”
She says that the men responsible for the sexual abuse and violence against victims of Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking enterprise should be held responsible.
“If you look at the definition of sex trafficking…[in]...federal...law,” Bien-Aimé said, “patronizers, solicitors, [and] men who obtain commercial sex acts from victims, are deemed as responsible as traffickers.”
That echoed a theme repeated by many speakers and those in attendance.
“Children have been molested with impunity,” said author Nick Bryant, who hosted the rally. Bryant was the journalist who first obtained Jeffrey Epstein’s notorious “little black book” full of contact information for his powerful and well-connected circle. That “black book,” he told the crowd, took him three years and rejections from editor after editor to get published anywhere online.
Nick Bryant wrote a book on a sex trafficking ring in Omaha, Nebraska called “The Franklin Scandal: A Story of Powerbrokers, Child Abuse & Betrayal.” That book alleged a criminal conspiracy involving prominent figures in politics, the media, and high finance, which flew children in foster care to the East Coast to be sexually abused.
Alisha Owen, one of the survivors of the ring, was imprisoned for 4 ½ years on perjury charges by a federal grand jury because she stood by her story.
“”My case came to light in 1988...I was called a liar,” Owen said. “By the way, this is the first time I’ve been able to talk about this.” At this, the crowd applauded her.
Owen said that Maxwell “is basically being prosecuted as a pimp. But how can you be a pimp without any Johns?”
She told the crowd how she was warned she would stay in prison until she was an old woman if she didn't recant. “But I’m here.”
“I’m just trying to show my solidarity and to stand with other survivors,” said Juli Abraham, who came with the Los Angeles organization Children of the Night. “As a survivor you sometimes feel alone...it’s nice to be around people who also experienced that sort of thing...you just feel supported.”