It’s been less than a week since Virginia Giuffre, one of the most visible and vocal survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s sex-trafficking enterprise, died by suicide. Giuffre’s death was preceded by not only a school bus accident that left her hospitalized and claiming she had just days left to live, but also a bitter custody battle with her estranged and allegedly abusive husband over their three children. Now, her family is offering their perspective on her final days and the message she left behind for fellow survivors of sexual abuse and assault.
On Wednesday, Giuffre’s brother, Sky Roberts, posted a heartbreaking note on Instagram, written by Giuffre the week before her death. In the caption, Roberts wrote that he believed his sister wrote the note in encouragement of a protest for Sexual Assault Awareness Month taking place in Washington D.C. on Wednesday.
“We are not going to go away,” Giuffre wrote. “Mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers need to show the battlelines are drawn and we stand together to fight for the future of victims.”
“Is protesting the answer—I don’t know, but we’ve got to start somewhere,” the note concluded.
“Hello world,” Roberts wrote in his Instagram post. “We received news today that there’s a protest in DC. We found a handwritten note that our sister Virginia wrote. I think it’s important that the survivors know that she’s with you and her voice will not be silenced. I know that it’s so important, and her wish is that we continue to fight.”
At 17 years old, Giuffre was allegedly trafficked to London, New York, and the U.S. Virgin Islands by Epstein and his accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell. Most notably, she accused Prince Andrew of rape in a civil lawsuit. Prince Andrew has repeatedly denied the allegations, but settled with Giuffre out of court for an undisclosed sum in 2022. She dedicated her adult life to dogged advocacy for fellow sexual abuse and trafficking survivors and defined the public discourse of the case against Epstein and Maxwell. As her family wrote in a statement following her death, “Virginia was a fierce warrior in the fight against sexual abuse and sex trafficking. She was the light that lifted so many survivors. Despite all the adversity she faced in her life, she shone so bright.”
Her family has since revealed that Giuffre was also in the middle of a different fight: Giuffre claimed her husband of 22 years had physically abused her throughout their relationship. Her brother and sister-in-law told People that on a family trip in January, he beat Giuffre so severely that she was left with a cracked sternum, perforated eye, and other injuries that required hospitalization. Meanwhile, in February, her husband filed for a restraining order that kept her from their three children (ages 19, 16, and 15) until June. The order, Giuffre’s family believed, was filed deliberately to keep Giuffre from obtaining full custody of the children. She was accused of breaching said order that same month.
“It’s the worst pain in the world to not have access to your children,” Roberts told People. “Can you imagine the pain? I will tell you, all the physical (pain) will never amount to the pain of being separated from your children in that way.”
“I was able to fight back against Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein who abused and trafficked me. But I was unable to escape the domestic violence in my marriage until recently. After my husband’s latest physical assault, I can no longer stay silent,” Giuffre told People weeks before her death. “Again, I thank everyone for their support. I have faith that justice will prevail.”
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