Epstein's Will Filed In U.S. Virgin Islands Two Days Before Suicide

The strange temple on Jeffrey Epstein's Little St. James in the U.S. Virgin Islands. Epstein's will was found Monday, on the neighboring island, St. Thomas.

The search for Jeffrey Epstein's will ended in the U.S. Virgin Islands on Monday, with the NY Post reporting that two days before he hanged himself in his cell, the millionaire sex offender was busy parceling out his wealth for his chosen beneficiaries.

Epstein signed his 21-page will from Manhattan's Metropolitan Correctional Center on August 8th, and it was subsequently filed in St. Thomas, the island adjacent his creepy oasis, Little St. James. It values his estate above $577 million—much more than the fortune catalogued for his bail request—excluding his bonkers art collection, which the NY Times accurately describes as "sizable, erotic, and bizarre." You know, the framed glass eyeballs; the Bill-Clinton-in-a-Dress painting; the shitting dog sculpture; the frankly staggering volume of nude portraits. All that stuff that begs appraisal before its true value can be tallied.

Epstein's will reportedly lists his brother, Mark Epstein, as the sole heir. It also names Darren K. Indyke and Richard D. Kahn, two of the financier's trusted associates, as executors; Boris Nikolic, a venture capitalist and former science advisor to Bill Gates, was reportedly designated as a successor executor, in case the other two can't perform their duties. The appointment "shocked" Nikolic: according to Bloomberg. He told the outlet: "I was not consulted in these matters and I have no intent to fulfill these duties, whatsoever."

Also on August 8th, Epstein reportedly established the 1953 Trust (1953 being his birth year), seemingly out a desire to keep the details of his financial life outside the public's reach. Because the trust is private, UCLA probate law expert Patrick D. Goodman told the Times it "avoids prying eyes." As such, we don't know whom he appointed as trustees, but according to Goodman, the wealth outlined in his will can't funnel into the trust "until any creditors, including victims who are owed damages or restitution, have collected what they are owed." The courts will determine that sum, meaning any beneficiaries will likely have to wait on their windfalls until all the lawsuits against Epstein's estate have resolved.

And as of Tuesday morning, the state faces three more of those, filed overnight in Manhattan federal court by a trio of women who say Epstein abused them in the early aughts—before, during, and after Epstein reported to country club jail for his one year of work release detention.

One, "Lisa Doe," contends an Epstein associate recruited her "to teach a dance-based exercise class" when she was 17 years old, according to CBS News. But Epstein ultimately started asking for massages, then "used a sex toy on her, forcibly," and asked that she enlist "other dancers" into his fold. Another, "Katlyn Doe," contends that—in addition to sexually abusing her as a minor, and coercing her into "los[ing] her virginity to him" once she was 18—Epstein made her marry one of his foreign associates so that person could, to quote CBS, "stay in the country and recruit more girls."

The third lawsuit comes from Priscilla Doe, who reportedly says she met Epstein when she was 20 years old, and that Ghislaine Maxwell subsequently groomed her for sex with him. Priscilla Doe also maintains that Epstein brought her to Little St. James, aka Pedophile Island, and took away her passport so she couldn't leave. On another occasion, she says, Epstein also made her serve hors d'oeuvres at a party he had with another accused child molester, Woody Allen.

For her part, Maxwell hasn't yet been charged with any crimes, although the feds are reportedly narrowing their investigation to focus on her role in Epstein's alleged sex trafficking ring. An enormous tranche of court documents released on August 9th makes many of the same allegations listed above—that Maxwell once held a 15-year-old Swedish girl hostage on Epstein's island by stealing the teen's passport; that she and Epstein trafficked their victims to a rotating cast of powerful, famous men—and according to those who knew them both, the British socialite was usually at the sex offender's side. Despite (apparently faked) photo evidence that Maxwell surfaced at a Los Angeles In-N-Out Burger last week, she remains out of the public eye.

Still, Maxwell is officially the subject of at least one lawsuit so far: last week, Jennifer Araoz sued Maxwell, along with three Epstein staffers and his estate, arguing that they all "conspired ... to make possible and otherwise facilitate the sexual abuse and rape of Plaintiff." Araoz says Epstein raped her when she was 15 years old.

On Thursday, two more women sued Epstein's estate and unnamed "recruiter," seeking $100 million in recompense for "the psychological devastation Mr. Epstein's predation caused" them. Their attorney, Lisa Bloom, said she was also vetting claims from five other women, and has called on the administrators of Epstein's estate to freeze his assets and hold them for victims. In all likelihood, these five complaints represent the first wave in a vast sea of legal action.