The family of a Jewish emigrant from Czechoslovakia, British media mogul Robert Maxwell, who is believed to have worked for the Israeli secret service Mossad, plays a significant role in Epstein's declassified files.
Robert's daughter and Epstein's partner, Ghislaine Maxwell, has been serving a 20-year prison sentence since 2021 for helping to procure underage girls for wealthy clients who then sexually abused them. In November 2025, US President Donald Trump did not rule out granting her a pardon.
Czechoslovak East
Robert Maxwell, whose real name was Abraham Leib Hoch, was born in 1923 in Slatinské Doly in Subcarpathian Rus, which at that time, together with Slovakia, Silesia, Moravia, and Bohemia, formed the Czechoslovak Republic—today it is part of Ukraine under the name Zakarpattia Oblast.
As his grandfather was a rabbi, Maxwell learned Hebrew in addition to his mother tongue, Yiddish, and later Czech at primary school – he also studied briefly in Bratislava. After the Hungarian occupation of part of Slovakia and Carpathian Ukraine (an independent state in the territory of Subcarpathian Rus), he fled to Budapest and subsequently became an Allied soldier. British General Bernard Law Montgomery awarded him the Military Cross for his bravery.
In early February 2026, the British Telegraph wrote that, according to its sources in the American secret services, it was Maxwell who recruited Jeffrey Epstein into the world of espionage. In 1991, Maxwell died, probably after falling from his yacht into the sea following a heart attack.
Maxwell was given a grand funeral in Israel, attended by former Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, former Israeli President Chaim Herzog, and at least six current and former heads of Israeli intelligence services.
A Slovak woman from Belarus?
Epstein's parents, Paula Stolofská and Seymour George Epstein, were born in New York at the end of World War I, with his father being a second-generation immigrant. Jeffrey Epstein's grandfather, Julius Epstein, was born into a Jewish family on the Polish-Belarusian border.
During Epstein's detention, investigators found not only cash in his safe, but also an Austrian passport with his photo, issued under a false name. According to Epstein's lawyers, he was advised to obtain a false passport because, "as a wealthy member of the Jewish faith," he was at risk of kidnapping when traveling abroad.
Similar circumstances are also associated with a woman who is set to inherit part of Epstein's estate. Like the sex offender's ancestors, his partner Karina Šuľaková also comes from Belarus. And, in order to travel more easily, she also obtained another passport – a Slovak one.
At the end of January, the US Department of Justice began publishing more than three and a half million new pages of documents related to the Epstein case. Among other things, these included two thousand videos and 180,000 photographs.
The files contain the names of well-known living and historical figures from Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. As reported by the Russian service of the BBC and the Czech portal Novinky, two days before his death, Epstein wrote a will according to which a native of Minsk with Slovak citizenship was to receive a large share of his estate.
According to Epstein's last will and testament, as evidenced by the published documents, the "Slovak woman" was to and also receive his islands Little St. James and Great St. James in the US Virgin Islands, where many girls and women were abused and raped. Last but not least, he bequeathed her a ring with a diamond weighing more than 32 carats.
This represents a significant portion of Epstein's approximately $600 million estate. His chosen one was to receive $50 million immediately and half of the trust fund with a lifetime annuity. However, he also left her 48 diamonds, luxury properties in Paris and New York, and a ranch in New Mexico, where Epstein and Maxwell allegedly impregnated underage girls.
It should be noted that Epstein applied for a visa to Belarus in 2016, stating that the reason for his visit was that he was interested in investing in a business there. However, it is not yet clear whether he received the visa and whether he visited Belarus on that basis. According to US media, Šuľaková lives in New York, and it is not yet known whether she will ever receive the property.