When Lisa Phillips met Jeffrey Epstein she had big dreams of becoming a top model.
Cover Girl, who said the late convicted sex offender abused her on his private island, is speaking candidly in a new podcast, “From now.” It aims to raise awareness about human trafficking and how it can affect anyone.
“It took me years to get to this point,” Phillips, now a model scout and agent in Los Angeles, told Fox News Digital. “I continue to struggle with the confusion of what happened to me years ago.”
Epstein grand jury records released, describe trafficker’s network for ‘grooming’ underage girls
Lisa Phillips tells about meeting Jeffrey Epstein. She claimed the late financier sexually assaulted her on his private island. (Brett Erickson)
“But as I started talking to other survivors, I started to realize that my story so many years ago was the same story – that of younger girls in Florida and older girls who were 18-25,” they shared.
Phillips started modeling at the age of 16. At the age of 19, she was already making her mark in fashion capitals like London and Paris. At the age of 21, she found herself in New York City, where she had booked a photo shoot in the British West Indies.
It was here that a fellow model told her about a nearby island – Little St. James.
“We had an extra day,” Phillips recalled. “He said, ‘Let’s get out of here. Let’s do something. I have a friend, a very good friend. He’s amazing. He has an island near him. Let’s go see it. He said he’d send a boat for us , and we could hang out there.
Lisa Phillips seen here heading towards Little St James. (Courtesy of Lisa Phillips)
The women boarded a boat and headed towards the island. When they arrived, there were other women already swimming in a pool and “enjoying themselves.”
At first, everything seemed “fine,” Phillips said. They had a “wonderful dinner” before Epstein came up to them and introduced himself.
Lisa Phillips tells her story in detail on the podcast “From Now On.” (Courtesy of Lisa Phillips)
“He was very charming,” she recalled. “He was the kind of person who captured you inside and made you feel very special, very safe and showed so much interest in who you are as a person. I’ve never received that much attention from a man, even Not even from my father, who expressed so much interest in everything I was talking about, what I was doing, what my aspirations and goals were.”
“I always remember he made me feel really special…he did that for everybody.”
Follow the Fox True Crime team on X
Jeffrey Epstein’s former home is on Little St. James Island in the US Virgin Islands. (Emily Micot/Getty Images)
However, she claimed that things changed “very quickly”.
That same night, a woman casually approached him and said Epstein wanted a massage. Confused Phillips said she didn’t know how to give it. The woman casually told him, “Just calm down.” After reassuring her, Phillips followed the woman. She felt safe with him.
Philips claimed that massage changed Epstein’s sexual assault case him in the room.
“That was the cover I shot the day I went to the island,” Lisa Phillips told Fox News Digital. (Courtesy of Lisa Phillips)
“It wasn’t straightforward, ‘I’m going to pull you into a room and abuse you,'” Phillips said. “He does things casually, like, ‘It’s just a massage, right?’ The girl went along with it and brought me into the room to massage her. It was a slow thing that turned into abuse.”
Lisa Phillips said she returned to New York City feeling very confused and “full of embarrassment”. (Courtesy of Lisa Phillips)
“I was on an island,” she said. “I wasn’t in a house where I could say, ‘Sorry, I need to go,’ and take my stuff. I was on an island far from home that I should never have been to.”
Phillips later learned that several women like her had alleged that Epstein had assaulted them under the guise of massages.
Sign up to receive the True Crime newsletter
Lisa Phillips said things changed rapidly the day she met Jeffrey Epstein. (Neil Rasmus/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)
She returned to New York City Filled with shame.
Phillips admitted, “After that, my life changed.” “I started doing drugs and drinking… I felt like I was stigmatized, or there was something wrong with me that I didn’t stand up for myself… And at that time everyone looked up to Jeffrey.
“During those years, he wasn’t some playboy hanging out on the scene. People talked about him a lot. When I brought up his name to people, they’d say, ‘We love Jeffrey. He did that for me, he got me the visa, he introduced me to my husband. He was always doing these big things for people, which was confusing to me.”
Lisa Phillips has a podcast, “From Now On”, which aims to educate listeners on sexual exploitation and human trafficking. (Brett Erickson)
Phillips also pointed out that this incident occurred in the early 2000s, long before the #MeToo movement, where victims of sexual abuse came forward publicly with their accounts. At the time, he said, “You would never speak about someone with that kind of power.”
Phillips said she “suppressed” the shame and confusion she felt because Epstein portrayed himself as a mentor who wanted to help.
“Nobody talked about the creepy massages and what was happening,” she said. “It was all hush-hush… He was dominant, and he was manipulative. He groomed you to believe he was your master.”
Get real time updates directly true crime center
Jeffrey Epstein is seen in a photo taken for the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services sex offender registry on March 28, 2017 and obtained by Reuters on July 10, 2019. (New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services/Handout via Reuters)
In 2006, Epstein was arrested on allegations that he hired teenage girls Erotic massage in your home in Florida,
Two years later, prosecutors allowed Epstein to plead guilty to a charge involving one of the victims. He served a 13-month sentence in a prison work-release program, then quietly began rebuilding his network of influential friends with the help of his socialite ex-girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell.
Following a series of Miami Herald stories about litigation denying justice to Epstein’s victims, federal prosecutors in New York revived the investigation and charged Epstein with sex trafficking in 2019.
Virginia Roberts Giuffre has a photo of herself when she was 16, when she says Palm Beach millionaire Jeffrey Epstein began sexually abusing her. (Emily Michot/Miami Herald/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
Epstein allegedly created and maintained a “vast network” and operation from 2002 to at least 2005 that allowed him to sexually exploit and abuse dozens of underage girls, in addition to paying victims to recruit other girls. “Enabled to do.
Prosecutors said the victims would be taken to a room with a massage table where they would perform massages on Epstein.
At the time of Epstein’s arrest, prosecutors said they found a cache of photographs of naked and semi-nude young women and girls in his $77 million Manhattan mansion. They also say additional victims have come forward since the arrests. He pleaded not guilty.
Click here to get the Fox News app
Jeffrey Epstein is seen here with Ghislaine Maxwell, who is now serving her sentence in a low-security federal prison in Tallahassee, Florida. (Joe Schildhorn/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)
On August 10 of that year, Epstein was found dead behind bars. He was 66 years old. The cause of death was suicide.
When Epstein killed himself in prison, prosecutors accused Maxwell of facilitating his illicit sexual relationships and participating in some of the abuses. The 62-year-old was convicted and is Serving a 20 year prison sentence.
Phillips said that although she hated her abuser, she cried after learning of his death.
Lisa Phillips admitted that she cried after hearing about Jeffrey Epstein’s death, which left her confused. (Brett Erickson)
“I don’t know why,” she explained. “He was a bad man, but I also had good thoughts about him… I was emotionally confused. But if he were still alive, I probably would have been too afraid to speak. I probably would have “Never talked openly. But… I was finally ready to talk about what happened to me.”
Phillips testified in a 2022 civil case involving another Epstein accuser, Virginia Roberts Giuffre. USA Today Informed. She also filed as Jane Doe under the Adult Survivors Act, citing abuse by an Epstein associate. According to the outlet, she received a settlement in a case involving JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Epstein’s accusers.
“The pain is in the numbers,” she explained. She said, “You can go through some kind of abuse and deal with it on your own… but when you start hearing about other women who had similar experiences with Jeffrey and other people, it makes you Has some effect on the psyche.”
Jeffrey Epstein’s sex trafficking associate Ghislaine Maxwell loses appeal
David Boies, representing several alleged victims of Jeffrey Epstein, arrives in New York federal court on Tuesday, Aug. 27, 2019, with Annie Farmer, second right, and Virginia Giuffre. Epstein, a convicted pedophile, had killed himself in prison earlier that month while awaiting trial on charges of conspiracy to solicit sex and trafficking of minors. (Mark Kauzlerich/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“…And when I started talking to other survivors, that’s when I felt validation…That’s when I felt safe talking about my experience without people shaming me. I wasn’t alone.”
Today, Phillips hopes her podcast will provide a platform for other victims like her who are recovering.
“I want people to know that there is a place you can come and be heard,” she said. “I also want to educate people how to advocate for themselves, and how to be mindful of red flags when building their career. Because this can happen in any type of business.”
Lisa Phillips wants her podcast to be a “safe space” for other victims of abuse to share their stories without fear. (Brett Erickson)
Click here to get the Fox News app
“I feel different today than I did yesterday,” she reflected. “It’s getting better. But I’m ready to start speaking out. And I’m ready to help others speak out, too.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
