Jane Doe vs Leon Black: the details
On July 25, 2023 Leon Black former CEO of Apollo Management was sued by an autistic woman who claimed he raped her at the age of 16. Here's what happened.
GRAPHIC WARNING.
On July 25, 2023 a woman identified only as Jane Doe filed a lawsuit against billionaire Leon Black, the former CEO of Apollo Management. Ms. Doe is autistic and was born with Mosaic Down Syndrome, a rare condition where only some of the body’s cells contain an extra chromosome. She alleges she was groomed by Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell to sexually service them and their wealthy friends and was an easy victim for them to manipulate because she thinks more like a child than an adult.
The abuse took a violent turn when Epstein allegedly handed her to Black like she was no more than a “ball” at Epstein's Manhattan mansion on East 71st Street according to the complaint.
I have copied some of the details from the lawsuit to share with you here. Please know the information is graphic and disturbing.
If you are sensitive, please stop reading here.
Excerpts from the lawsuit:
1. In 2002, at his Manhattan townhouse, 9 East 71st, Jeffrey Epstein executed a “hand off” to his close friend Leon Black. But what passed directly to Black’s hands from the hands of Jeffrey Epstein was a human being – not a ball.
2. The human being, Jane Doe, is autistic, and she was 16 when Jeffrey Epstein introduced her to Black and said she was to give his “special friend Leon Black” the same kind of massage that she had to give to Jeffrey Epstein when he ordered her to. Even as Black grabbed her hand so hard that she thought he broke bones, Jeffrey Epstein knew Jane Doe would never disobey. Developmentally she is about 12, and when she was threatened to do as told because “bad girls” get in “trouble,” she did as she was told.
3. Black took her to the third floor of the townhouse, to a massage room where she had been before with Jeffrey Epstein. There, using adult sex toys in her anus and vagina, he raped her. His physical force such hat when he left her on the floor sobbing, she was bleeding. As set forth below, Jeffrey Epstein refused to take her to a doctor, and instead said that Ghislaine Maxwell would take care of it.
4. Sadly, Ms. Doe’s experience is one more in a long line of despicable and heinous experiences inflicted on a minor trapped in Jeffrey Epstein’s web – a web that extended to a group of powerful and influential men, including Leon Black.
Skipping some content, here’s where Leon Black steps into the picture:
60. In or around late spring of 2002 or early summer, Elizabeth told Plaintiff that she was being “shipped off” to New York City. She said that Charlie would be driving her to meet Epstein’s “special friend,” a man named Leon Black. Elizabeth emphasized that Leon Black was a “very important and special person” to “Jeffrey,” and she threatened Plaintiff that she “better” receive a “good report” that Plaintiff was a “good girl” for Jeffrey and his important, special friend.
61. Charlie drove Plaintiff to Epstein’s New York City townhouse.
62. There, she was summoned to Epstein. She found him standing with a huge older man -- Black is 6’4” and about 300 pounds. The two men appeared to be having a conversation.
63. Epstein introduced Plaintiff to Leon Black, using his full name, and told her that Black was “important” and “special” to Epstein. Plaintiff was struck by Black’s immense size. Plaintiff’s initial impression of Black was that he looked like an “ogre,” and she felt frightened.
64. Plaintiff noticed Black’s bulbous nose and that his face and neck had a number of skin tags and moles.
65. Epstein told Plaintiff that because she was his “special girl,” he had selected her specifically to give his “special friend,” Black, a massage.
66. Epstein told Plaintiff that she was to give Black the same kind of “massage treatment” that she gives Epstein – meaning that it would involve sexual intercourse and she was expected to strip naked.
67. Black took Plaintiff by her hand, squeezing it so hard that she thought he might have broken bones, and led her upstairs to a massage room on the third floor of the townhouse. She had been in the room with Epstein on her prior stay at the townhouse.
68. In the room there were a variety of oils and adult sex toys next to the massage table.
69. Plaintiff assumed that Black would proceed to disrobe before laying down on the massage table, the way Epstein usually did.
70. Instead, Black picked Plaintiff up and threw her over his shoulder and then threw her violently down on the massage table on her back, so hard he knocked the wind out of Plaintiff. She thought the massage table might have broken. She tried to scream but Black placed his hand over her mouth and leaned over her while ripping off her shirt and under her skirt pulling her underwear off.