Jean-Luc Brunel, model-scout pal of late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, has been taken into custody in France for questioning on suspicion of raping and trafficking minors, Paris prosecutors said.
Brunel, who was being investigated as part of a French probe into the sexual abuse of women and girls by Epstein and his friends, was picked up Wednesday at Paris’ Charles de Gaulle airport, officials said. He was about to board a flight to Dakar, Senegal, the Guardian reported.
Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre alleges that Brunel, 74, had once “gifted” the late financier three 12-year-old French girls from poor families for his birthday.
She alleged that Brunel bought them in Paris from their parents, promising to promote their modeling careers, then shipped them to New York to be sexually abused by Epstein. They were allegedly returned to France the following day.
Giuffre, who has claimed she was coerced into being Epstein’s “sex slave,” made the disturbing disclosure in court papers.
A former Dutch model, Thysia Huisman, has accused Brunel of drugging and raping her when she was 18. She hailed his arrest as “great news.”
“I have tears of joy. Finally after all this time, justice is being done,” she said, according to Agence France-Presse.
Huisman said she reported Brunel to French authorities in August 2019, and since then 11 other accusers have come forward.
Parisian authorities first opened their case into Brunel after Huisman’s report and conducted a search of his agency, Karin Models, in the high-end 8th arrondissement that September.
Brunel’s lawyer in October 2019 said he vehemently denied the allegations and denied his client was on the lam, insisting he was available to the cops for questioning.
Long before the Epstein scandal broke, Brunel was accused of rape by several models in a 1988 CBS documentary.
Ghislaine Maxwell introduced Brunel to Epstein in the 1980s, according to the Guardian.
Photos from 2003 obtained by The Post in August showed Brunel and Maxwell romping together on Epstein’s Caribbean Little St. James Island — which was dubbed “Pedophile Island’’ by locals.
Maxwell was arrested in July on charges she recruited girls and women to be abused by her and Epstein. She has pleaded not guilty.
Epstein killed himself in a Manhattan jail cell in August 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.
With Post wires
