Long Before Epstein: Sex Traffickers & Spy Agencies
August 23, 2019
Elizabeth Vos reviews the unsavory history of intelligence agencies
providing protection to child sex-trafficking rings.
Jeffrey Epstein's compound in the Virgin Islands. (YouTube)
By Elizabeth Vos
Special to Consortium News
The alleged use of sexual blackmail by spy agencies is hardly unique to the
case of Jeffrey Epstein. Although the agencies involved as well as their
alleged motivations and methods differ with each case, the crime of child
trafficking with ties to intelligence agencies or those protected by them
has been around for decades.
Some cases include the 1950s -1970s Kincora scandal and the 1981 Peter
Hayman affair, both in the U.K.; and the Finders' cult and the Franklin
scandal in the U.S. in the late 1980s. Just as these cases did not end in
convictions, the pedophile and accused child-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein
remained at arms' length for years.
"For almost two decades, for some nebulous reason, whether to do with ties
to foreign intelligence, his billions of dollars, or his social connections,
Epstein, whose alleged sexual sickness and horrific assaults on women
without means or ability to protect themselves. remained untouchable,"
journalist Vicky Ward wrote in The Daily Beast in July.
The protection of sex traffickers by intelligence agencies is especially
interesting in the wake of Epstein's death. Like others, Epstein had long
been purported to have links with spy agencies. Such allegations documented
by Whitney Webb in her multi-part series were recently published in
Mintpress News.
Webb states that Epstein was the current face of an extensive system of
abuse with ties to both organized crime and intelligence interests. She told
CNLive! that: "According to Nigel Rosser, a British journalist who wrote in
the Evening Standard in 2001, Epstein apparently for much of the 1990s
claimed that he used to work for the CIA."
Vicky Ward, who wrote on Epstein for Vanity Fair before his first arrest,
and claimed the magazine killed one of her pieces after Epstein intervened
with editor Graydon Carter, said in a Tweet that one of Epstein's clients
was Adnan Khashoggi, an arms dealer who was pivotal in the Iran Contra
scandal and was on the Mossad (the Israeli intelligence agency) payroll.
This was also noted in a book "By Way of Deception" by former Mossad agent
Victor Ostrovsky.
The Times of Israel reported that Epstein was an "active business partner
with former prime minister Ehud Barak" until 2015, adding: "Barak formed a
limited partnership company in Israel in 2015, called Sum (E.B.) to invest
in a high-tech startup.. A large part of the money used by Sum to buy the
start-up stock was supplied by Epstein."
Webb wrote he "was a long-time friend of Barak, who has long-standing and
deep ties to Israel's intelligence community." On the board of their company
sat Pinchas Bukhris, a former commander of the IDF cyber unit 8200.
Epstein's allegedly protected status was revealed by Alexander Acosta, the
former U.S. attorney in Miami who gave Epstein an infamously lenient plea
deal in 2007. Acosta, who was forced to resign as President Donald Trump's
labor secretary because of that deal, reportedly said of the case: "I was
told Epstein 'belonged to intelligence' and to leave it alone."
Alexander Acosta: "Told to leave it alone." (Flickr/Gage Skidmore)
Kincora Boy's Home
Several cases in the unsavory history linking intelligence agencies and sex
scandals put the allegations against Epstein in context. Among these was the
U.K. Kincora Boy's Home, where at least 29 boys were reported to have been
targeted at the Belfast, Northern Ireland, facility from the mid-1950s until
the late 1970s, until it was shut in 1980. It also involved the alleged
protection of child sexual abusers at the home and among their clients.
The Irish Times wrote that "destitute boys were systematically sodomised by
members of Kincora staff and were supplied for abuse to prominent figures in
unionist politics. The abusers - among them MPs, councillors, leading
Orangemen and other influential individuals - became potentially important
intelligence assets."
The Belfast Telegraph also quoted former Labour Party MP Ken Livingstone,
who said: "MI5 weren't just aware of child abuse at Kincora Boys' Home -
they were monitoring it. They were getting pictures of a judge in one case,
politicians, a lot of the establishment of Northern Ireland going in and
abusing these boys."
Three staff were eventually convicted of sexually abusing minors, which
included the housemaster William McGrath, a loyalist "Orangeman" and
allegedly an MI5 agent, according to the Belfast Telegraph in July 2014.
Kincora Boy's Home. (YouTube)
Although the U.K.'s Historical Institutional Abuse inquiry ultimately found
"no credible evidence" to support the allegations, two former U.K.
intelligence officers maintained their claim of MI5's involvement: Brian
Gemmell says he alerted MI5 to the abuse at Kincora and was told to stop his
investigation; and a former army intelligence officer, Colin Wallace,
"consistently claimed that MI5, RUC special branch and military intelligence
knew about the abuse at Kincora and used it to blackmail the pedophile ring
to spy on hardline loyalists," according to The Guardian.
The Irish outlet, An Phoblacht, wrote: "The systematic abuse of young boys
in the Home and the part played by the British intelligence organisations to
keep the scandal under wraps ensured that one side of the murky world of
Unionist paramilitarism and its links to the crown forces was kept out of
the public domain for years."
In the U.S., the New York State Select Committee On Crime in 1982
investigated nationwide networks of trafficking underage sex workers and
producing child pornography. Dale Smith, a committee investigator, noted
that call services using minors also profited from "sidelines," besides the
income from peddling prostitution. Smith said they sold information "on the
sexual proclivities of the clients to agents of foreign intelligence."
Presumably, this information could be used to blackmail those in positions
of power. Smith added that one call service sold information to "British and
Israeli intelligence."
The Hayman Affair
Ken Livingstone "MI5 monitored abuse at Kincora Boys' Home. (World Economic
Forum)
Another U.K. scandal included allegations that Sir Peter Hayman, a British
diplomat and deputy director of MI6, was a member of the Pedophile
Information Exchange (PIE).
Police discovered that two of the roughly dozen pedophiles in his circle had
been writing to each other about their interest in "the extreme sexual
torture and murder of children," according to the The Daily Mail.
In 2015, The Guardian reported that former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher
had been "adamant that officials should not publicly name" Hayman, "even
after she had been fully briefed on his activities..formerly secret papers
released to the National Archives shows."
Still, Hayman was unmasked as a subscriber to PIE in 1981 by M.P. Geoffrey
Dickens, who also reportedly raised the national security risk of Hayman's
proclivities, implying they were a potential source of blackmail sought by
intelligence agencies.
The British tabloid The Mirror reported that intelligence agencies,
including the KGB and CIA, kept their own dossiers on U.K. establishment
figures involved with PIE and the abuse of minors, to blackmail the targets
in exchange for information.
Hayman was never charged for his association with PIE: The U.K. attorney
general at the time, Sir Michael Havers, defended the decision and denied
claims that Heyman was given special treatment.
Labour Party MP Barbara Castle allegedly gave a dossier she compiled on
pedophiles in positions of power to U.K. journalist Don Hale in 1984 when he
was editor of the Brury Messenger. Hale alleged that soon afterward, police
from the "Special Branch, the division responsible for matters of national
security," raided his office and removed the Castle dossier. They then
threatened him with a "D-notice," which prevented him from publishing the
story on the threat of up to 10 years in prison.
The Finders Cult
Another group accused of trafficking children, which had links to
intelligence agencies, was the "Finders" cult. In 1987, The Washington Post
reported that two members were arrested in connection with the alleged abuse
of six children. Investigators found materials in Madison County, Virginia,
which they said linked to a "commune called the Finders."
Vauxhall Cross, London, headquarters of British Secret Intelligence Service.
(Laurie Nevay, CC BY-SA 2.0, Wikimedia Commons)
Besides nude photographs of children, a Customs Service memo written by
special agent Ramon Martinez refers to files "relating to the activities of
the organization in different parts of the world, including "London,
Germany, the Bahamas, Japan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Africa, Costa Rica, and
Europe."
Martinez's memo notes that a Finders' telex ordered the purchase of two
children in Hong Kong. Another expressed interest in "bank secrecy
situations." The memo also documents high-tech transfers to the U.K.,
numerous properties under the Finders' control, the group's interest in
terrorism, explosives, and the evasion of law enforcement.
Martinez describes the swift end to his investigation. He wrote that on
April 12, 1987, he arrived at the Metropolitan Police Department and was
told that all the data was turned over to the State Department which, in
turn, advised MPD that "all travel and use of passports by the holders was
within the law and no action would be taken. Then he was told that the
investigation into the Finders had become a CIA internal matter. The MPD
report was classified, not available for review" and "No further action will
be taken."
Martinez was not the only person with unanswered questions. The U.S.News &
World Report wrote that N. Carolina Rep. Charlie Rose (Dem.), chair of the
House Administration Committee, and Florida's Rep. Tom Lewis (Rep.) asked
"Could our own government have something to do with this Finders
organization and turned their backs on these children? That's what the
evidence points to," says Lewis, adding that "I can tell you that we've got
a lot of people scrambling, and that wouldn't be happening if there was
nothing here."
The leniency shown by the State Department and the fact that the CIA would
designate the investigation of the Finders group as "an internal matter"
raises serious questions. What motive might have driven the CIA to associate
with or protect a child abuse ring?
Harry S. Truman State Department building. (Paco8191, CC BY 3.0, Wikimedia
Commons)
The Franklin Scandal
The Franklin Scandal erupted in 1988, centering on a child-trafficking ring
operating in Omaha, Nebraska, by Lawrence E. King Jr., a former vice
chairman of the National Black Republican Council: It was alleged that
children were provided to politicians in Washington, D.C., and elsewhere,
among other illegal activities.
The late former state Sen. John Decamp alleged in his book "The Franklin
Coverup" that a special committee of the Nebraska Legislature launched a
probe to investigate the affair, which involved King being indicted for
embezzling money from the Franklin Credit Union. The committee hired former
Lincoln, Nebraska, police officer Jerry Lowe, whose reports suggested that
King was involved in "guns and money transfers to Nicaragua," and was linked
with the CIA.
James Flanery, an investigative reporter at The World Herald who reported on
the scandal, told associates that King was "running guns and money into
Nicaragua," and that the CIA was heavily involved."
Like many scandals before and since, the Franklin case ended with no
prosecution of the perpetrators. However, Paul Bonacci, one of the alleged
victims, was indicted for perjury. He had alleged that he was sexually
abused as a minor in Nebraska and around the country where he was flown by
Lawrence King.
In 1999, the Omaha World Herald reported Bonacci was awarded $1 million in
damages due to his lawsuit against King and other alleged perpetrators.
Decamp, who was Bonacci's attorney, told the newspaper "Obviously, you don't
award $1 million if you don't think he (Bonacci) was telling the truth."
Given the history of child trafficking rings that were allegedly connected
with or enjoyed the protection of intelligence services, it is possible that
similar claims about Jeffrey Epstein are something the authorities, though
unlikely given these other instances, should investigate.
Elizabeth Vos is a freelance reporter and regular contributor to Consortium
News.