ST. CROIX — A federal judge recently granted a motion for two attorneys to withdraw as counsel for former Governor Kenneth Mapp and former Attorney General Vincent Frazer in a civil lawsuit filed by six anonymous plaintiffs who claim they were sexually assaulted by the late Jeffrey Epstein and other co-conspirators.
Six women identified as Jane Does initially sued the Virgin Islands government as well as former elected officials and one current elected official in a civil complaint filed November 22, 2023 in District Court for the Southern District of New York. The six plaintiffs, individually and on behalf of all others similarly situated, subsequently filed an individual and class action second-amended complaint on May 24.
The defendants named in the class-action lawsuit are the government of the Virgin Islands, former Governor John de Jongh Jr. and his wife, Cecile de Jongh, former Governor Kenneth Mapp, former Attorney General Vincent Frazer, Delegate to Congress Stacey Plaskett, and former Senators Celestino White Sr. and Carlton Dowe, who now serves as executive director of the Virgin Islands Port Authority, as well as 100 anonymous men listed as John Does.
The plaintiffs filed the second-amended complaint against the defendants for alleged violations of negligence and the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act. The defendants are accused of facilitating the alleged abuse and trafficking of New York victims and accepting charitable contributions and political donations from Epstein’s New York bank accounts in exchange for their facilitation in the trafficking of victims.
Epstein, a convicted sex offender, killed himself in August 2019 in a Manhattan correctional facility while awaiting trial on charges of sexually abusing dozens of girls, some as young as 14 years old. He was 66. Epstein owned two islands off the coast of St. Thomas known as Little St. James and Great St. James.
The defendants allegedly knew Epstein was trafficking young women and wealthy men from New York for the sole and exclusive purpose of engaging in commercial sex acts in the Virgin Islands, according to the second-amended complaint. The lawsuit claims the defendants not only agreed with Epstein and/or his co-conspirators to facilitate the venture but actively assisted Epstein in his operation by coercing and exerting influence over all individuals and entities that could have, and should have, prevented the venture from continuing, namely law enforcement, airport personnel, customs agents and U.S. Coast Guard officials.
Assistant Attorney General Venetia Velazquez, of the VI Department of Justice, and attorney David Ackerman, of Motley Rice LLC in Washington, D.C., initially represented Mapp and Frazer in the case when the complaint asserted claims against the VI government and against Mapp and Frazer solely in their official capacities. The plaintiffs, in their second-amended complaint, asserted claims against Mapp and Frazer in their individual and official capacities because they committed the conduct alleged before, during, and/or after they left office. Because the plaintiffs expanded their allegations, a potential for conflict of interest has arisen that may affect the ability for Velazquez and Ackerman to represent Mapp and Frazer, according to a motion to withdraw as counsel filed July 2 by Velazquez and Ackerman.
District Judge Arun Subramanian noted in his order filed Wednesday granting the motion to withdraw as counsel that Frazer did not object to the motion, but Mapp filed an opposition. After discussing the potential conflict with Mapp, Frazer, Velazquez, and Ackerman, the court ordered Mapp and Frazer to either hire new counsel or inform the court that they were electing to proceed pro se, a Latin term that means they would represent themselves.
On August 16, Mapp wrote to the court indicating that he would represent his “personal interest” in the case pro se, the judge noted in his order. Subramanian indicated that Frazer did not provide the court an update on whether he retained new counsel but had never objected to Velazquez and Ackerman withdrawing. Therefore, the judge noted that he granted the motion to withdraw.
