Jeffrey Epstein: Up to 130 people claim they could be child of dead financier with £470m fortune
‘He could even be a grandfather,’ DNA firm’s founder says
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More than 100 people claim they could be the offspring of the deceased financier Jeffrey Epstein, who is thought to have had a personal fortune of around £470m.
A DNA company, which set up a website called epsteinheirs.com, said as many as 130 people had come forward – including a number of Britons – since the site’s launch.
Hundreds more had been in touch with tips regarding Epstein’s possible fathering of children, The Sun reported.
Epstein, who died in a jail cell last year, was never known to have had children, but anyone able to prove the convicted sex offender is their father would be in line to claim some of his fortune, which includes a New York City mansion and a 75-acre luxury estate.
“Jeffrey Epstein was sexually promiscuous for so long that there is a reasonable chance he may have fathered a child,” the founder of DNA firm Morse Genealogical Services, Harvey Morse, said.
“He could even be a grandfather.”
If the company established a convincing lead, they would petition a US court for a DNA test to confirm the genetic link, Mr Morse added.
“About a quarter of the calls have required investigation but so far we have not felt confident to take any further.”
Though a medical examiner ruled Epstein died by suicide before be could be tried on fresh charges of sex trafficking, controversy continues to swirl around the incident in August.
Dr Michael Baden, the former chief medical examiner of New York City who was hired by the family to oversee the autopsy, has suggested Epstein may have been murdered.
“I think the evidence points towards homicide rather than suicide,” Mr Baden said during an interview with Fox News last year, noting that some bones in Epstein’s neck were broken in a way that would suggest pressures inconsistent with a hanging.
In March, a lawyer who met Epstein in the days before his death cast similar doubt on the episode.
“The reason I say I don’t believe it was suicide is for my interaction with him that day,” David Schoen said. “The purpose of asking me to come there that day and over the past previous couple of weeks was to ask me to take over his defence.”
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