- A woman has accused billionaire
Leon Black of raping her inJeffrey Epstein 's Manhattan home in 2002. - She says Epstein arranged for her to give Black a massage, but alleges Black assaulted her instead, according to court papers.
- A spokesperson for Black has denied the allegations, calling them "complete fiction."
A former model has accused billionaire Leon Black of sexually assaulting her at Jeffrey Epstein's Manhattan townhouse in 2002, according to court documents.
The woman, only identified as "Jane Doe," says Epstein arranged for her to give a $300 massage to Black at Epstein's mansion in 2002, but alleges that the co-founder of the private equity firm Apollo Global Management assaulted her instead, according to court documents filed on Monday first reported by Vanity Fair.
Doe said Black later paid her $5,000 to "help with her credit card debt."
A spokesperson for Black called the claims "complete fiction" and a "baseless smear campaign" in a statement to Insider.
"This claim is complete fiction and has no basis in fact or law," the spokesperson said. "It is telling that it is asserted anonymously and concerns events that allegedly occurred some 20 years ago, 15 years after the statute of limitations expired. We expect that the courts will see this frivolous claim for precisely what it is."
Doe had said in court documents that she didn't report the rape in 2002 because a friend said no one would believe her.
The woman's allegations were filed by the law firm Wigdor LLP, as a proposed second amended complaint on behalf its client, Guzel Ganieva, who accused Black of raping her in court filings earlier this year.
Black's spokesperson accused the law firm of attempting to damage his reputation with the latest accusations:
"The previous complaints the Wigdor firm brought against Mr. Black were shown to be demonstrably false by objective, contemporaneous documentary evidence. Not surprisingly, in that lawsuit, Wigdor has resisted every effort by Mr. Black to take discovery, because Wigdor knows that disclosure of the facts will eviscerate their false claims. Having failed in their first two attempts to destroy Mr. Black's reputation, Wigdor is now manufacturing new allegations that will be shown to be as false and defamatory as the last two pleadings Wigdor filed.
"It is abundantly clear that the only goal here is to publicly destroy Mr. Black's personal and professional reputation and to defame him by perpetrating a baseless smear campaign. Mr. Black is confident that those who have abused the court process so egregiously and attacked his reputation so recklessly will be held responsible for their misconduct."