Jeffrey Epstein helped Ghislaine Maxwell's father stolen millions (2024)

Robert Maxwell employed Jeffrey Epstein to hide the hundreds of millions he stole from the Mirror's pension funds, a bombshell new documentary has claimed.

Maxwell died in 1991 at the age of 68 after falling from his yacht in the Canary Islands and there is still mystery around what happened to the £800 million missing from his firms.

However, a new BBC series, House of Maxwell, has claimed that the late media tycoon used disgraced paedophile Epstein to hide his stolen millions.

The link could also explain how Epstein made his fortune, something that has long been shrouded in mystery.

It also suggests that Epstein met Maxwell's daughter Ghislaine through her father and before his death.

Previously, it was thought that Ghislaine and Epstein met after her father's death. She is serving 65 years in prison after being convicted of sex trafficking and facilitating Epstein's abuse.

Her father Robert's media empire plunged into chaos after his death, with the discovery that£460 million had been fraudulently appropriated from the Mirror Group's pension fund.

Eventually, £800 million was found missing from Maxwell's firm and it has been claimed that Epstein, who was found dead in his prison cell in 2019, masked it.

One former friend of Ghislaine, Vassi Chamberlain, told the programme: 'I was in the City and I had some friends who worked on Wall Street during that time and they heard that Jeffrey Epstein and Robert Maxwell had entered into an agreement before Robert Maxwell's death, whereby certain funds had been siphoned off.

'That is what Jeffrey Epstein was doing at the time, he was helping very rich people park their money offshore, to avoid tax.'

Colin Barr, the executive producer of the series, said: 'I think we now know for a fact that Robert Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein knew one another before Maxwell died, I think there is no question about that.'

It is thought that Epstein's money came froma money management firm in the US Virgin Islands.However, the firm has no public records or client lists.

Epstein reportedly funded second-in-command Ghislaine's lavish lifestyle.

Sheclaimed to be worth just £2.6million at the time of her arrest despite buying and selling £16million of mansions since 2015 and having£22million wired to her by the paedophile.

The 60-year-old 'favourite' daughter of disgraced media mogul Robert, who was a billionaire at the height of his wealth, also reportedly transferred £15million to her husband Scott Borgerson after they secretly married in a move that could protect the majority of her wealth from being claimed by victims.

Forensic accountants believe Maxwell had a net worth of £15million ($20.2million) in 2015 - but she claimed this was down to just £2.6million by the time she was arrested in 2020.

Mysterious transactions between Epstein, Maxwell and offshore funds as well as buying and selling homes using private companies have made it impossible for the FBI to fully gauge exactly how much cash and assets the now convicted child sex trafficker has.

Herlife of opulence as Jeffrey Epstein's 'second-in-command' was laid bare in court where jurors in the 60-year-old British socialite's trial were shown never-before-seen photographs of paedophile Epstein's £60million fleet of jets, which he used to shuttle Maxwell and teenage girls between his lavish homes.

ButMaxwellinsisted her wealth had evaporated, forcing her to sell the London home where Prince Andrew allegedly had sex with his accuser to a property developer for £1.75 million in August. It is said to be where the Duke of York was photographed with his arm around the bare waist of then 17-year-old Virginia Roberts, one of convicted paedophileEpstein’s victims, now known as Virginia Giuffre.

Maxwell used her impeccable social contacts to introduce Epstein, a gardener's son, to society. In return, she used the financier's millions to support a lavish lifestyle which included a new home for her in Manhattan.He also transferred £22million [$30.7million] to her over a period of eight years, her trial heard.

And five years ago she sold her US home in New York’s Upper East Side for £11.3million. In the same year she bought a £2million mansion with her husband Scott Borgerson in the resort of Manchester by the Sea, Massachusetts, and in 2019 she allegedly bought a New Hampshire ranch called ‘Tuckedaway' with Mr Borgerson, where she was eventually arrested by the FBI.

Maxwell is reported to have bought the house in cash in but those involved in the transaction claim not to have interacted with her, according to the Daily Beast, with the suggestion being she used one of a number of her aliases.

Her father Robert Maxwell's 22-stone naked body was found dead, floating in the Atlantic ocean on 5 November 1991, after making himself unavailable to staff who wanted answers to the huge discrepancies in company finances.

Just a day before, Maxwell was on the phone to his son Kevin, regarding a meeting that was scheduled with the Bank of England.

Maxwell had £50,000,000 in loans with the bank, but despite this, decided to miss the meeting and continue travelling on the Lady Ghislane.

When he died, his publishing empire began to collapse after banks loaning him huge sums were calling in for their money back.

It also emerged that Maxwell had used hundreds of millions of pounds from his companies' pension funds, in order to shore up his shares of Mirror Group, to stop the businesses from filing for bankruptcy.

BBC Two's House of Maxwell gives insight into the complex family dynamics, hinting at a difficult upbringing for his daughter, ex-socialite and convicted sex offender Ghislane, and her siblings.

Former Sunday Mirror editor, Eve Pollard, describes the complicated relationship between Maxwell and his children, including Ghislaine, said she is 'sure he loved his children'.

But she said that it is a 'sort of love that can grab you by the throat as well as by the heart', adding: 'You never knew which way it would go.'

She spoke of the family base in Headington Hall, which became the house of media tycoon Robert Maxwell - but he supposedly spent very little time in the home with his loved ones.

'When you go to Headington Hall, at the root of it there is Bob’s wife Betty and there are the children,' she said.

‘Bob, often, barely went home at the weekend, or went home for an hour or two, half a day, and then come back to the Sunday Mirror on a Saturday night.

‘You’d think he’d stay in that lovely house with his children.

And that would’ve been quite hard sometimes, I mean you want your father to be this lovely, cosy, father, to love you unconditionally.

‘And also he had a family where children had died, one child was in a car crash, I mean, they’d had a lot of tragedy in that family.

‘And yet they kept going and the children were all well-educated, obviously went to school and did well because Betty helped them and Bob rather insisted on it.

‘I’m sure he loved his children, I saw him being very fond of Ian and Kevin and Ghislane.

‘But it’s the sort of love that can grab you by the throat as well as by the heart, and you never knew which way it would go.’

House of Maxwell starts Monday on BBC Two at 9pm.