Le Monde: Saint-Tropez served as recruitment hub in Epstein sex-trafficking network

PARIS, France — PARIS — French daily Le Monde reported that Saint-Tropez was used as one of the main locations in the sex-trafficking network run by U.S. financier Jeffrey Epstein, according to French judicial documents and witness testimony reviewed by the newspaper. The report said Epstein traveled regularly each year to Saint-Tropez as well as Paris, and that French investigations found the region and the French Riviera played a central role in the trafficking operations he ran with his associates. According to Le Monde, modeling agency MC2 director Jean-Luc Brunel was among the leading figures in the network. Police records cited by the paper indicated Brunel used his agencies to help Epstein reach young women. Brunel, who faced sexual assault charges, was found dead in a French prison in February 2022 in an apparent suicide. In the United States, Epstein was charged in 2019 with sex trafficking of minors, and an official investigation into his death in custody concluded it was a suicide.