The week after the death of financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, Anya (not her real name) opened the door to his New York apartment. Epstein's brother Mark was outside, telling him he had to leave, he says.

Anya had lived for years in one of several apartments on East 66th Street in Manhattan that Jeffrey Epstein used to house the women he abused.

In an instant, Anya lost her home, but escaped a nightmare.

Mark Epstein denies having knowledge of his brother's illicit activities.

“It's still hard for me to accept that I was a victim of abuse for years,” Anya says. "They didn't chain you to a door or anything like that. They didn't lock you in a basement. The chains were less obvious, but they were there."

Epstein, who died in 2019 while awaiting trial for child sex trafficking, often said that his organization was “like a cult, and that he was the leader of the cult,” Anya says.

The woman gives the BBC an exceptional account of her life as one of Epstein's "assistants", detailing how the financier maintained control over many of his victims for so long.

The assistants were a group of women—about 12 at a time, according to Anya's estimate—who lived in Epstein's home, worked at all hours at his beck and call, and were victims of sexual abuse by him regularly.

Anya claims that they were subjected to elaborate deceptions and empty promises of work, before he began to coercively control almost every aspect of their lives, exploiting any vulnerabilities he could discover.

According to her, he controlled their finances, dictated who they saw, and psychologically humiliated them.

Anya claims that he monitored their bodies obsessively and forced her to undergo unnecessary surgeries that disfigured her.

Sarah Kellen, another former assistant, confirms Anya's account of Epstein's control.

Earlier this year, Kellen testified before the US House Oversight Committee how Epstein presented himself as the savior of the assistants.

"He was very skilled at annihilating your ability to make your own decisions and have autonomy. And that made you increasingly dependent on him," he said.

There is a bias that tends to make people believe that only children are susceptible to this type of coercion, but “you can be manipulated as an adult,” says Tara Quinn-Cirillo, a clinical psychologist who has worked with victims of coercive control.

“You can be vulnerable to this,” he adds.

“A complete montage”

After Jeffrey Epstein's conviction in 2008 for abusing a teenager—whom he took home with the promise of working as a masseuse—he changed tactics.

It began to focus mainly on adult women, especially from Russia or Eastern European countries.

Anya claims that she and many of the other women recruited still looked like teenagers, and to prove it, she showed the BBC photos of herself from that time.

Anya grew up in a Russia that was emerging from the communist regime, with strict parents who instilled in her that “education would be the key to success,” she says.

But opportunities were scarce and, armed with her university degree, she left Russia to work as a model.

She worked in Europe for luxury brands such as Fendi and Chanel. I had friends, a support network, and family I could visit whenever I wanted.

When she was in her early 20s, she entered Epstein's orbit by visiting an agency in Paris and meeting modeling scout Daniel Siad.

He praised her intelligence, “something rare in the modeling industry,” says Anya, and suggested introducing her to a friend of his with contacts in the fashion world: Epstein.

Anya says she used to wonder what would have happened if she hadn't stopped by the agency that day, but now she believes she was caught deliberately.

“It was a total trap,” he points out, describing Siad as “a professional trafficker.”

Siad's name appears thousands of times in the Epstein files, the huge collection of documents about the financier that the US government released in January.

Siad's lawyer said he would not comment; He previously denied having any knowledge of the danger Epstein represented.

It so happens that Siad was found dead on Monday, July 20, in Paris. Authorities opened an investigation to determine the causes of death.

Anya says she met Epstein at his spacious 18-room apartment in Paris, decorated with photographs of him posing with the likes of Bill Clinton and other world leaders.

She says she felt comfortable because there were two other women present: one Russian and the other, Epstein's then-girlfriend, originally from Eastern Europe.

According to Anya, Epstein asked her to strip naked so he could see her body for modeling purposes.

While in her underwear, the financier told her she was “not in shape” and needed to “start exercising,” calling her lazy.

Anya claims that comments like that were common in the modeling industry, and she believed his claims that if she worked hard, she would be introduced to the right people.

The woman says that he asked her about her family and her interests.

“What I was trying to achieve in life, why I dedicated myself to modeling, all the things that were important to me,” he evokes.

“In the world of fashion they don't ask you those questions,” he says.

Several women have told the BBC that Epstein liked to know what was important to them and then use that information against them.

He also addressed their concerns directly.

“I see that you are intelligent and distrustful,” she remembers him saying. “I don't want to sleep with you.”

Anya says this calmed her down even more. "I was saying to myself, 'Oh my God, this man is incredible. He knows me inside out,'" she says.

Promises and deceptions

This was just the beginning of a manipulation process that would unfold over many months, in which Anya was duped with empty promises and prolonged deception.

For almost a year, Anya began training “religiously” to get the body Epstein wanted, she says.

Lesley Groff, the assistant who managed Epstein's schedule, would send him emails to update him on his progress, and Epstein would pressure Anya to send him photos, telling her not to be “shy” when he insisted she get naked.

According to Anya, Epstein finally arranged a meeting between her and Faith Kates, co-founder of modeling agency Next Management, as he had promised her.

The meeting lasted less than 30 minutes and she was told that Epstein would inform her of the outcome.

Anya explains that the financier told her that Next didn't want to hire her because she "wasn't good enough for the New York market," and Epstein added that she was "out of shape."

Anya says she was devastated. Epstein asked her to visit him in Palm Beach, Florida, where he was on parole while serving his sentence.

According to her, the financier blamed his conviction on a girl who - he said - had deceived him with a false identification.

Anya had to sign a register for a uniformed police officer to see him.

Epstein accompanied her to a room where he sexually assaulted her for the first time. At least two other women have testified that he sexually assaulted them while he was serving his sentence.

After the attack, Epstein began joking with the other attendees waiting outside, commenting that Anya was “very shy.” According to her, everyone laughed at her, and her reaction made her blame herself.

"I thought maybe nothing bad had happened. Maybe my reaction was wrong," he says. “Maybe it's because of my Russian upbringing, maybe it's because of how strict my parents were, but I felt like there was something weird about me, not him.”

Anya says it was only when Epstein's files were released that she realized what had really happened.

The emails suggested that, despite her face-to-face meeting with Faith Kates, the agency founder had rejected her a year earlier.

Anya claims that she realized that Epstein had been deceiving her for months and had set her up to fail, in an “extremely elaborate recruitment process.”