I used to be pushed to a chateau and raped by Epstein’s mannequin agent good friend

It was an incident that formed her life for ever. When Annemarie Ettekoven was raped on the age of 20, it destroyed her confidence and crushed her profession as a mannequin earlier than it had even begun.

Now 65, a softly spoken lady with a metal resolve who works as an historic archivist, she says that after the assault she felt so ‘stupid and ashamed’ that she stored her trauma to herself.

‘I was very cautious after that,’ she says. ‘I’m fairly certain I selected the occupation I did as a result of it’s behind the scenes.’

There is a grim irony, then, to the truth that she and different victims of her rapist at the moment are on the centre of a scandal inflicting headlines world wide. Because the person she accuses of raping her was French mannequin agent Jean-Luc Brunel.

Earlier this yr, when the Epstein information had been unsealed by a U.S. court docket — paperwork regarding the affairs of convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein — Brunel’s identify featured prominently. It despatched a chill down Ettekoven’s backbone.

Indeed, little by little, the testimony of girls like her is shining a lightweight on the hyperlinks between Epstein and Brunel and offering horrifying perception into what seems to have been an industrial-scale trafficking ring between the U.S. and Europe.

Once named King of the Catwalk, Paris-born Brunel was a mannequin scout who labored with among the trade’s prime names, together with Jerry Hall and Monica Bellucci, and took credit score for ‘discovering’ fashions Christy Turlington and Milla Jovovich.

But on his travels he additionally scoured cities for ladies he might groom and sexually exploit, reportedly offering Epstein with greater than 1,000 victims.

Fashion offered the proper cowl for his or her depravity. Brunel’s now-dissolved MC2 company, for instance, which represented fashions who walked for lingerie model Victoria’s Secret, was allegedly used to lure teenage women with affords of modelling work. Epstein was finance adviser to Victoria Secret’s billionaire chief government, Les Wexner.

Epstein and Brunel at the moment are lifeless, having apparently dedicated suicide of their respective jail cells whereas awaiting trial.

Epstein died on the age of 66, within the U.S. in 2019, having been charged with the trafficking of minors; and Brunel at 75, in France in 2022, whereas awaiting the tip of prison investigations for rape, rape of minors, sexual harassment and human trafficking.

Brunel had been arrested and charged after accusations of rape by Virginia Giuffre, the girl who claims she was paid by Epstein to have intercourse with Prince Andrew, which the prince vehemently denies. For Ettekoven, it’s time to inform her story. Robbed of her probability to look Brunel within the eye from the witness field, she is adamant that the world ought to know precisely what he did to her.

‘I just want the family to realise that their loved one was not who they thought he was,’ she says. He was twice married however had no kids. ‘Some of Brunel’s surviving family are nonetheless hurting the victims by publicly proclaiming that he’s harmless. They gained’t settle for that he did something mistaken. That may be very merciless to his victims.’

In reality, most of the ladies who’ve to this point spoken out about Brunel inform very comparable tales of isolation, imprisonment and assault, pointing to a calculated and brazen modus operandi.

Today, Ettekoven lives a quiet life simply outdoors Amsterdam. Her priorities are her work, her husband and their two grown-up kids. When she was 19 she travelled to Paris to check artwork historical past on the Sorbonne. She discovered work as an au pair to a mom who had been a profitable mannequin with the Paris-Planning company.

‘I’d been working for her for some time when she recommended I might make it as a mannequin, and we went collectively to see Paris-Planning.’ It was May 18, 1979. At the desk, they informed me I used to be stunning however as a result of I had no expertise, I ought to begin at a smaller Paris company.’

She was directed to the Paris Karin company, the place she met the top booker, Jean-Luc Brunel, who was then 33. ‘He was very enthusiastic about my looks and keen for me to go to the countryside with him and other models to do my test shoots. He asked me to join the group at 9pm that same night and gave me an address.

‘I turned up at an apartment with my packed bag. Jean-Luc was there, along with the model agent I had met earlier. There was another French man with black hair and three other girls. They looked younger than me.’

Ettekoven says that at 11pm their get together left in two automobiles. ‘One of the other girls told me we were going to a remote chateau to do the photoshoot.’

On the best way, the group stopped at a restaurant. It was midnight. Ettekoven remembers sitting at a protracted desk the place ‘almost immediately a sexual atmosphere developed’.

‘The men were laughing at pornographic images in a magazine. I felt more and more uneasy.

‘I asked Jean-Luc in private if I could get my suitcase from his car and leave. I said that I was afraid and didn’t need to be a part of this.

‘He told me that I had nothing to fear, that I was under his protection. He said, “as director of the agency, I will see that nothing will happen that you do not want”. And so I stayed. I believed him.’

Ettekoven completed her dinner and the group headed for the countryside. ‘This was an era without mobile phones or the internet. I realised in that car that no one knew where I was. It was pitch black when we arrived at the castle . . . Jean-Luc showed me to my bedroom with dark wood panelling and an antique bed. I put on my nightgown. I was very tired and ready to sleep.’

But Brunel had different concepts. ‘He knocked on my door, proposing that we do a series of photos outside, in front of the car headlights. He had convinced me that I had nothing to fear from him and so I went with him in his car.’

As the 2 drove down the lengthy, darkish driveway, Brunel began asking Ettekoven what she earned as an au pair. ‘I told him about 500 francs a month. He said, “You could easily get 30,000 francs a month like ***”, naming another young model he was paying that kind of money to. Then he started to kiss me and put his hand between my legs. That’s when all the pieces turned. He informed me if I didn’t give in to him, he would depart me within the woods.

‘I told him I didn’t need to get cash in that method. He very slowly drove again to the fort. I received out of the automobile and ran inside. I came upon a go well with of armour as I fled upstairs to my bed room. Everyone else was of their rooms. I locked my door and vowed to go away subsequent morning.’

Ettekoven had been in mattress for only a few minutes when she heard a sound coming from the wardrobe. It was Brunel. ‘To my horror, he was passing through a hidden door in the closet between our adjoining rooms. He was almost naked, dressed in just a T-shirt and underpants. I froze. He took my arm and pulled me through the closet into his own room.

‘I struggled as he put me on his bed. I tried to get away and turned my head from him. I said in French, “I don’t need this.” He raped me anyway. I received away afterwards, again by means of the closet into my very own room. I barricaded the door with chairs. All I might take into consideration was working away as quickly because it was gentle.’

On opening the shutters subsequent morning, she mentioned: ‘I had no idea where I was. There wasn’t a soul in sight and nowhere I might go for assist. I went down for breakfast and located among the others in an enormous room . . . A maid was serving a really elaborate breakfast . . . Jean-Luc entered the room. He ignored me fully. I blushed as the boys made enjoyable of me.’

Ettekoven says that Brunel and one other man loudly mentioned arranging for female and male prostitutes from Rouen to come back to the fort that night. They had been planning an orgy and made it clear I might be part of it. Jean-Luc mentioned he would make nude photos of me. I knew at that time that I needed to flee.

‘There was an American girl there, a friend of the castle’s then proprietor. I requested her to assist me go away. She took me to the proprietor’s workplace. He agreed that I didn’t slot in effectively there. He informed me there was a railway station a brief distance away. I requested him to take me to the station, with the lady within the automobile with us. I didn’t need Jean-Luc alerted as I used to be afraid he would maintain me prisoner there if he knew I used to be making an attempt to go away.’

Within half an hour, Ettekoven was on her approach to a prepare station 9km from the fort. ‘The station was Forges-les-Eaux. I’ve by no means forgotten the identify. I waited two hours there within the sunshine. All I might suppose was, “Thank God, I’m alive.” That dominated my ideas. I actually believed at the moment, had I stayed on the fort, I wouldn’t have gotten out alive.’

During the two-hour wait on the platform for a prepare again to Paris, Ettekoven wrote down all the pieces that had occurred to her in a letter to a good friend. ‘I arrived in Paris at 7pm that evening.’

The following Monday, Ettekoven returned to her work and didn’t inform anybody about what had occurred to her. Throughout her grownup life, she quietly carried the occasions of that day along with her — till the dying of Jeffrey Epstein in 2019. At that time, the partitions had been closing in finally on Brunel.

When French magistrates issued an enchantment for alleged victims to come back ahead, Ettekoven determined she could be one in every of them. A number of weeks later, in September 2019, Ettekoven was interviewed by police in Paris. Until then, she had informed nobody about what occurred apart from her sister and her husband.

On December 16, 2020 — 41 years after Ettekoven’s rape — Brunel was arrested. ‘I was so relieved. I no longer felt afraid,’ she says.

Yet the case towards him instantly got here up towards a critical impediment — the 20 yr French statute of limitations on prosecutions, which meant she and a lot of the different ladies who had come ahead with claims of sexual assault towards Brunel had been out of time to carry fees towards him.

It was solely when Virginia Giuffre got here ahead to French police that the case might proceed.

During a gathering with the investigating officer in Paris in 2021, Ettekoven was informed that they had found the precise location of the fort utilizing her calculation of the gap to the closest prepare station and drone surveillance: ‘It was Castle Gaillefontaine.’

She had her personal essential data for the police, too, within the form of the draft letter she had written on the prepare station all these years in the past, together with the prepare ticket she had purchased for her journey again to Paris.

‘I found it all perfectly preserved, wrapped in an envelope inside a trunk . . . I posted the letter to a friend but kept a draft as a sort of evidence for myself. Proof that it was not just a bad dream.

‘Even though I was outside the statute of limitations, the fact I was clearly telling the truth about Brunel supported others’ instances.’

On February 19, 2022, they obtained the information Brunel had killed himself in his cell at Paris’ La Santé jail the place he was being held on remand. ‘I was shocked, relieved and angry all at once. It was a lot to take in,’ says Ettekoven. ‘I had wanted desperately to confront him, to tell him what he had done to me.’

Last month, in an additional affront to the alleged victims, Brunel’s attorneys demanded an administrative inquiry into alleged judicial failures after Brunel killed himself. They describe ‘major dysfunctions’ by the judiciary, which they’re holding chargeable for his dying. His dying ‘was not guided by guilt but a profound sense of injustice’, mentioned Brunel’s attorneys.

‘I don’t consider that,’ says Ettekoven. ‘I believe he knew that, with all the evidence against him and the number of women willing to speak out, that he could not escape any more. I know that the evidence I kept for all those years helped to put him behind bars.’

Now one other lady has launched a civil motion towards the Jean-Luc Brunel property. Using the alias Jessica Kramer, she claims that Brunel drugged and assaulted her when she was working as a mannequin in LA on the age of 18.

In testimony which is chillingly harking back to Ettekoven’s, she claims to have been pushed to a property, the place she was imprisoned and subjected to abuse, finally escaping by means of a window.

Ettekoven hopes that revealing her id will encourage nonetheless extra victims to come back ahead. ‘I can’t think about I used to be the one one abused in that place . . .

‘The thing that hurts me the most was that I trusted him. I’m certain that should have been the case with numerous women.’