By Julie K. Brown
Virginia Roberts Giuffre, a survivor of child sexual abuse whose crusade against Jeffrey Epstein led to his arrest and changed the way the criminal-justice system treats victims of sexual assault, has died by suicide, her family announced Friday. She was 41.
Giuffre, who is survived by three children, died in Australia, where she had been living for many years.
“It is with utterly broken hearts that we announce that Virginia passed away last night at her farm in Western Australia,” her family said in a statement released to the media. “She lost her life to suicide, after being a lifelong victim of sexual abuse and sex trafficking.”
At the time of her death, Giuffre had been in a contentious divorce and child custody battle with her husband, Robert. She was also recovering from a car accident in Australia. In a recent post on social media, she had said she was in renal failure and had days to live. She said her last wish was to see her children, with whom she was estranged. She was later released from the hospital without comment and her condition was not known.
Giuffre was the most prominent Epstein survivor whose legal actions against the wealthy Palm Beach financier; his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell; and Prince Andrew garnered national attention and outrage over the case. Her voice led many other Epstein survivors to come forward.
But the pressure of going up against Goliath forces took its toll. She was often sick and was viciously attacked on social media even in the weeks since her accident. Despite her health struggles, she continued to champion the rights of other survivors through her non-profit, Speak Out, Act, Reclaim (SOAR).
Marci Hamilton, CEO of Child USA, which advocates for child sexual assault survivors, said she considered Giuffre a true hero. Her work on behalf of survivors led to a movement that continues to impact both the civil and criminal justice systems — not just in the U.S. — but around the world.
“Her story was global and she kept telling it again and again even though she was attacked by powerful people,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton explained that the public doesn’t understand the impact of trauma on child sexual assault victims -- or how it affects their mental and physical well being.
“The tragedy here is this is a reminder that survivors need justice, but it’s never enough by itself. The horror and the trauma of this crime is it can affect an entire lifetime,” she said.
Two other Epstein victims, Skye Patrick and Carolyn Andriano, also passed away. Both of them died of drug overdoses. Many of Epstein’s survivors have spoken about the shame they’ve felt, blaming themselves for what happened even though they were minors when they were recruited by Epstein.
Born Virginia Roberts on Aug. 9, 1983, in Sacramento, California, Virginia — whose nickname was Jenna — spent her early years in California with her parents, Lynn Trude Cabell and Sky William Roberts. She had two stepbrothers, Sky and Daniel.
Her father was a maintenance manager for apartment complexes and condo buildings in California before moving the family to Loxahatchee, Florida, when Virginia was in grade school.
She was first sexually abused at the age of 7 by a family friend, an event that she said changed her entire life.
“I went from being a very happy child to a completely different person. If you look at my school photographs, you can see the drastic change in my eyes from kindergarten to second grade,” she told the Miami Herald in a 2017 interview.
She frequently ran away from home. When she was 14, she was recruited by Miami sex trafficker Ron Eppinger, who kept her as a prisoner, while pimping her out on the streets of Miami. She was later rescued by police and the FBI. She returned home and began working as a spa attendant at Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s Palm Beach Country club. Her father, who worked at the club, got her the job in June 2000, when she was 16.
It was there that she met British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, who brought her to meet Epstein at his mansion on El Brillo Way, a short distance from the club. Epstein hired her as a traveling masseuse —and at first she hoped that she could become a professional massage therapist.
But from the beginning, Epstein and Maxwell began sexually abusing her and trafficking her to other men, she said. When she was 19, Epstein flew her to Thailand for massage training — and to pick up a girl whom he wanted to traffic. It was there she met martial arts trainer Robert Giuffre. They married in 2002 and the couple moved to his native Australia. Initially, she led a quiet life, and had no plans to report what had happened to her.
But after giving birth to her daughter, she decided to go to the FBI in hopes of getting Epstein and other people she had been abused by arrested. U.S. authorities, however, had already given Epstein a secret plea deal, allowing him to escape serious federal charges.
VIDEO: Virginia Roberts Giuffre talks about Ghislaine Maxwell, Jeffrey Epstein, and plans for a baby
She nevertheless mounted a crusade for justice by filing lawsuits that were settled out of court but led to new evidence against Epstein. In 2018, she was featured prominently in a Miami Herald series, Perversion of Justice, which detailed how Epstein’s lawyers worked hand in hand with the Justice Department to cover up the scope of his crimes, which led to him spending just 18 months in jail.
READ MORE: Perversion of Justice series
The series, which featured several other Epstein victims, led the U.S. Attorney in the Southern District of New York to open a new case against the financier in 2019. Epstein was arrested in July of that year, but was found dead in his federal jail cell a month later. His death was ruled a suicide by hanging.
READ MORE: How a future Trump Cabinet member gave a serial sex abuser the deal of a lifetime
Maxwell was arrested in 2020 and prosecuted for sex trafficking. She is serving a 20-year sentence in a federal prison in Florida.
Prince Andrew, whom Giuffre had also accused of abusing her, was never charged, but he settled a lawsuit that she had filed against him for a reported $14 million in 2022. He denied he was ever involved with Giuffre but he was nevertheless disgraced and and stripped of his royal titles.
READ MORE: Prince Andrew settles sex suit with Jeffrey Epstein accuser
More than any other figure, Giuffre fought to expose every person who had helped Epstein. Her efforts were part of a cultural awakening in the way the criminal justice system treats crime victims, especially for child victims of sexual assault.
Among those she accused was high-profile lawyer Alan Dershowitz, who aggressively denied he had anything to do with Epstein’s crimes. The two were engaged in legal battles for years, but Giuffre finally settled, admitting that she might have been mistaken in identifying Dershowitz as an abuser.
In court documents, she named a number of other wealthy and powerful men whom she alleged that Epstein and Maxwell had directed her to have sex with. All of the men denied her allegations and none of them were ever charged.
In recent months, Giuffre had urged U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to unseal the FBI’s Epstein case files. After vowing she had the files and intended to make them public, Bondi released a binder of material that revealed no new information about the case. Giuffre expressed her disappointment on social media.
“It’s disheartening to witness what feels like a dog and pony show turned political stunt. True democracy should embody freedom, yet we continue to find ourselves trapped in a system that overlooks our struggles until it’s convenient for those in power,” she said in March.
Then in April she posted a photo on Instagram in which she was covered in bruises in the hospital. She said in the post that her car had been struck by a school bus and that doctors discovered she was in renal failure and she had days to live.
“I’m ready to go, just not until I see my babies one last time. My heart is shattered and every day that passes my sadness only deepens,” she wrote.
Days before the crash she lamented not being able to see her children.
“I miss them so very much. I have been through hell and back in my 41 years but this is incredibly hurting me worse than anything else,” she wrote on Instagram.
Police in Australia, however, said the accident had been minor. She was released from the hospital and media reports indicated she had been scheduled in June to enter a plea in court to a restraining order.
READ MORE: Epstein accusers say financier flaunted his depravity — and VIP visitors had to be aware
At the time of her death, she had been living separate from her husband and children.
In addition to her parents and her husband, she is survived by her three children, Christian, Noah and Emily.
If you are considering self-harm, you can call or text the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988.
This story was originally published April 25, 2025 at 11:36 PM.
