Bank of America has reached a $72.5m (£54.6m) settlement in a lawsuit brought on behalf of victims of Jeffrey Epstein, who had accused the bank of facilitating his sex trafficking operation.
The proposed class-action lawsuit was filed in October by a Florida woman who says she was abused by Epstein “on at least 100 occasions” between 2011 and 2019 and held two accounts at Bank of America at the direction of his business team.
It alleged that the bank had “a plethora of information regarding Epstein’s sex trafficking operation but chose profit over protecting the victims”.
In the court documents, Bank of America says the settlement makes “no admission of liability” or “wrongdoing” on its part.
The settlement was reached earlier this month, but details of the deal had not been revealed until documents were filed on Friday in a federal court in New York. They now await a judge’s approval.
Sigrid McCawley, a lawyer for the victims, told the BBC in a statement earlier this month that the resolution was “one more step on the road to much deserved justice”.
It marks the third such settlement by a major bank, after JP Morgan Chase and Deutsche Bank agreed to pay out $290m and $75m respectively.
The lawsuit, brought on behalf of a “Jane Doe”, cites a record of “incredibly alarming and erratic banking behaviour” in her own Bank of America accounts, which were used by Epstein’s team.
BBC