Denied a Trial, Epstein’s Victims Vent Fury at Hearing

Several women who said they had been sexually exploited by Jeffrey Epstein spoke of their anger and frustration at an unusual hearing in Manhattan on Tuesday during which a federal judge formally dismissed the charges against the financier after his suicide.

Denied a trial, Mr. Epstein’s accusers stood in court at the hearing to talk about how they had been coerced at a young age into having sex with Mr. Epstein, then were pressured to continue seeing him. Many spoke through tears. It was a moment of catharsis in a criminal proceeding that had been cut short when Mr. Epstein was found dead in his cell two weeks ago.

One of his accusers, Courtney Wild, told the court that Mr. Epstein’s suicide had robbed her and other victims of the chance to confront him in court. “For that, he is a coward,” she said.

“I feel very angry and sad,” said Ms. Wild, holding back tears. “Justice has never been served in this case.”

Some of the women, who withheld their names, said Mr. Epstein had victimized them a second time by him taking his own life. “It felt like new trauma all over again,” a woman said.

Others, like the actress Anouska De Georgiou, said they were appearing out of a spirit of solidarity. “I am every girl he did this to, and they are all me,” she said, “and today we stand together.”

Prosecutors told the court the investigation continues into several employees and others who are believed to have aided Mr. Epstein in his long-running sex-trafficking scheme, helping to procure dozens of teenage girls and women to have sex with him for money.

The dismissal of Mr. Epstein’s case “in no way prohibits or inhibits the government’s ongoing investigation into other potential co-conspirators, nor does it prevent the bringing of a new case in the future,” a government prosecutor, Maurene Comey, said. She added those inquiries “have been ongoing, remain ongoing and will continue.”

Judge Richard M. Berman scheduled the hearing on Tuesday after federal prosecutors wrote to him last week, saying that in light of Mr. Epstein’s death, they planned to drop the criminal charges against him — a decision that requires a judge’s approval.

“I believe it is the court’s responsibility, and manifestly within its purview, to ensure the victims in this case are treated fairly and with dignity,” he said at the start of the hearing.

Prosecutors had charged that Mr. Epstein brought dozens of underage girls, some as young as 14, to his mansion in New York and to his compound in Palm Beach, Fla., between 2002 and 2005. He then engaged in sex acts with the girls during naked massage sessions, prosecutors said, paying them hundreds of dollars in cash each time.

Mr. Epstein also encouraged some of his victims to recruit additional girls who were then abused, allowing him to maintain “a steady supply of new victims to exploit,” the indictment had charged. He was indicted on charges of sex trafficking and sex trafficking conspiracy, and if convicted, could have faced up to 45 years in prison.

The judge, in a brief order, said he wanted to hold the hearing because the public might still have an “interest in the process by which the prosecutor seeks dismissal of an indictment.”

The judge did not elaborate, but his statement seemed to acknowledge the extraordinary public interest in the questions surrounding Mr. Epstein’s death and the future of the government’s broader investigation into his associates.

Judge Berman said in the order that he wanted to hear from the prosecution and the lawyers who had been representing Mr. Epstein, and he also invited Mr. Epstein’s accusers and their lawyers to address the court if they wished to.

As if to underscore the wide interest in the matter, the hearing was moved from the judge’s regular courtroom to a much larger one that is typically used for the high-profile cases.

Mr. Epstein was found dead around 6:30 a.m. on Aug. 10 after apparently hanging himself with a bedsheet in his jail cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, where he was being held pending trial on sex trafficking and conspiracy charges.

Law enforcement officials say he had not been checked on for about three hours, a violation of jail protocol. The city medical examiner said on Aug. 16 that it had determined Mr. Epstein died by suicide.

The news of Mr. Epstein’s death — and the circumstances surrounding it — sent shock waves through the justice system and prompted an outcry in Congress and investigations by the F.B.I. and the Justice Department’s inspector general.

Attorney General William P. Barr called the shortcomings at the jail “serious irregularities,” and pledged to determine why Mr. Epstein was apparently left unsupervised just weeks after he was taken off suicide watch after an apparent initial attempt at killing himself on July 23.

“We will get to the bottom of what happened and there will be accountability,” Mr. Barr said after Mr. Epstein’s death.