Hugh Hefner repeatedly alerted the FBI that a Playboy Playmate had been sexually assaulted and trafficked by Jeffrey Epstein and others – but the agency allegedly ignored all his tips.
According to court records reported by News Nation, a then 23-year-old Audra Christiansen told Hefner in 2005 that she had been a survivor of Epstein and asked him to call the FBI on her behalf with the allegations because he had more status than she did with the authorities. The documents claimed she met the disgraced financier, and “before she knew it she was naked and raped by Epstein” and then “trafficked for 10 years.” How awful. The Playboy founder allegedly called the agency several times, but no one investigated the claim for 15 years, despite promising to help and to follow up on Audra’s claims. The FBI didn’t reach out to her until October 2020.
Related: Modeling Scout Who Was Named Thousands Of Times In The Epstein Files Has Been Found Dead
The accusations are in a complaint filed by 34 Epstein survivors against the United States in Southern Florida. Per Miami Herald reporter Julie K. Brown, who covered the complaint in her Substack column, Audra alleged the FBI didn’t investigate her allegations and by not doing so “violated mandatory policies and protocols requiring it to investigate claims, like Ms. Christiansen’s, of child sexual abuse and trafficking” and “failing to investigate credible tips, such as Ms. Christiansen’s allegations, the FBI created a foreseeable zone of risk to future victims of Epstein’s sex trafficking enterprise, including Plaintiffs.”
Speaking to NewsNation, Audra shared that she contacted the FBI in 2020 after receiving threats but STILL nothing ever happened:
“I called again (to the FBI) in 2020 due to threats that were happening to our family. I have never been able to speak to the FBI. I even hired an attorney to speak to them, and they would not meet with her or I. Still nothing from the DOJ or FBI.”
Audra even hired a lawyer to sit down with the FBI, but the agency shut her down again! WTF! The model told the outlet:
“My attorney was blown away; they didn’t want to hear from me.”
That is heartbreaking to hear. Arick Fudali, who represents several of the survivors, reacted to the allegations against the FBI to NewsNation, saying:
“The latest reporting about the FBI ignoring complaints about Epstein in 2005 are devastating but not surprising. Law enforcement has failed Epstein’s survivors for decades and continues to do so today at the highest level.”
The survivors deserve justice. And we hope they get it one day.
Audra then claimed she was not the only Playboy Playmate allegedly a victim of Epstein:
“I was not the only playmate that had issues with perpetrators Epstein or otherwise. They are too afraid to step forward, but it was a big deal back then. Hef was trying to keep us all safe.”
It is important to note, however, that Hugh has been accused of sexual misconduct over the years, including in a docuseries in 2022 about how he allegedly coerced and drugged women into having sex at the Playboy mansion. A lawsuit in 2016 also accused him of enabling Bill Cosby to sexually abuse a model at the mansion. And that’s only scratching the surface of the horrifying allegations against him…
Audra went on to say she discovered one of her FBI 302 forms used by agents to summarize or report an interview that they conducted. She claimed that “at first it was heavily redacted, almost everything identifying me was concealed except my ZIP code,” but that changed when she joined other survivors to reach out to then Attorney General Pam Bondi:
“Then, for the first time, I joined other survivors in sending a letter to Pam Bondi (then- U.S. AG). It was my first significant mainstream public statement as a survivor. That same week, my 302 was suddenly changed. Portions that had previously been redacted were made public specifically, information identifying me as a Playboy Playmate while my name and phone number remained protected.”
No matter what anyone may say, Audra does not think this was “accidental.” She continued:
“The timing and the very specific information that was selectively unredacted are difficult for me to view as accidental. Of all the identifying details that could have been released, the fact that I had been a Playboy Playmate was exposed immediately after I publicly spoke out. That distinction matters because, to my knowledge, I am the only former Playboy Playmate who has publicly come forward as a survivor in connection with this case. Revealing that detail made it significantly easier to identify me, even without publishing my name.”
As many have said for months, we should be doing everything we can to protect the victims. And yet our government is failing them over and over again. Disgusting. To make matters worse, it took her reaching out to a major news outlet for help to get the detail redacted three months later. Not even her elected officials could help her. Audra recalled:
“For me, the sequence is important: my 302 was redacted, I made my first major public statement with other survivors, and within that same week the document was altered in a way that exposed a uniquely identifying detail about me. I believe that timing and selective disclosure deserve serious scrutiny. It took me over three months to get it back to redacted. I called congressmen, my governor, my attorneys, no one could get it redacted except Reuters. They called the DOJ and it was back to being redacted immediately.”
The whole situation is just not OK. She shouldn’t have had to jump through so many hoops to protect her identity.
Per reports, the FBI is currently trying to dismiss the 34 Epstein survivors’ lawsuit. According to the bureau, they were too late to file since the cases happened between 1996 and 2017:
“Plaintiffs each had two years from the date of their respective injuries to file an administrative claim with the appropriate federal agency.”
We’ll see what happens with the case, but our thoughts are always with the survivors, who are bravely fighting back.
If you or someone you know has experienced sexual violence and would like to learn more about resources, consider checking out https://www.rainn.org/resources.
[Image via FayesVision/WENN, DOJ]