383: What if you survived Jeffrey Epstein?

Summary

Podcast Summary: This Is Actually Happening, Ep. 383 – “What if you survived Jeffrey Epstein?”

Date: November 11, 2025
Host: Whit Misseldine (Wondery)
Featured Guest: Lisa Phillips

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Overview

This harrowing episode centers on Lisa Phillips, a survivor of Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse. Lisa recounts her journey through the modeling industry, the emotional and psychological grooming she experienced, and the challenges she faced during and after her encounters with Epstein. The episode is a raw, unflinching account not only of abuse but also of the long, difficult path toward healing, self-acceptance, and empowerment.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Lisa’s Early Life & Modeling Aspirations

• (03:24–09:00) Lisa describes a multicultural upbringing between New York, England, and Europe. Despite hands-on parenting, she experienced a lack of emotional validation and felt unseen, shaping her desire to seek affirmation externally, especially through modeling and pageantry.
• Lisa highlights both privilege and absence: “I was definitely loved... But ‘I’m proud of you’ and ‘I love you’—those words of affirmation... I didn’t really get growing up.” (06:10)

2. Entry into Fashion Industry

• (09:00–13:00) Moving from Miami to New York, Lisa flourished as a mixed-race model, finding early success. She was, however, quickly exposed to the industry's dark underbelly: rampant drug use, sexual harassment, and predatory behaviors normalized by agents and other models.
• “I was just adored by the way that I looked... I was always wearing a mask. It wasn’t really the true me.” (11:32)

3. First Encounter with Epstein - The Island

• (13:00–20:15) During a magazine shoot in Tortola (BVI), another model invited Lisa to Epstein’s private island. Initially, she was charmed by his attention and what seemed like mentorship.
• “[Epstein] started asking me some deeper questions... It was more of a mentorship, fatherly... It didn’t feel like he was attracted to me.” (16:20)

4. Assault and the Mechanism of Grooming

• (19:04–23:30) Lisa is coerced into giving Epstein a massage. The situation escalates to sexual assault alongside another model.
• She details the particular psychological trap: “When you’re on an island, you are trapped. You can’t go anywhere. I don’t know this person, what he’s capable of.... I was frozen, basically.” (19:04)
• The normalization and concealment by other victims is clear: “She was just like, ‘It’s okay. This is Jeffrey. This is what he likes.’” (20:10)

5. Aftermath: Shame, Self-Destruction, and Continued Manipulation

• (23:31–32:00) Lisa describes her disintegration in the aftermath—shame, self-harm, substance abuse, and the sense of being “damaged.” Epstein’s team relentlessly pursues her to return, leveraging promises and professional opportunities.
• “After that trip, I started to abuse myself. Now I was in their world. Because now I felt really worthless and full of shame. Now I was damaged.” (22:10)
• Epstein manipulated her career ambitions—referring her to Katie Ford, leading to Lisa joining Ford Models, after which the web of coercion, implicit threat, and further abuse deepened.

6. Pattern of Control, Networking, and Complicity

• (32:01–35:00) Epstein, through introductions and his network (including modeling agencies and celebrities), orchestrated situations for further abuse and exploitation.
• “There was so many weird things going on between 2000 and 2003.” (34:36)
• Ghislaine Maxwell is mentioned as a creepy, intimidating presence and a facilitator within the ring.

7. Awareness and Breaking Away

• (35:00–38:30) The turning point arrives when a friend reveals forced sexual acts involving high-profile individuals (including a prince). Lisa connects the dots, recognizes patterns of trafficking and blackmail, and decides to end all contact—moving across the country to escape.
• “That was the darkest I saw Jeffrey... He tried to show me that you’re going to be quiet, you’re not going to say anything. So I left. And I left in a lot of fear that day.” (38:10)

8. Suppression, Survival, and Solo Healing

• (38:30–43:00) Lisa describes the years of emotional suppression, focusing on motherhood, moving away from the industry, and not speaking of Epstein’s abuse—even to her husband.
• “We raised our kids to this day. But there was no vulnerability, no deep talks... I would never say in a million years anything about Jeffrey Epstein.” (41:20)

9. Triggered by Epstein’s Death — Path to Speaking Out

• (43:57–47:05) In 2019, upon the news of Epstein’s alleged suicide, Lisa has an emotional breakdown, struggling with the complexity of Stockholm syndrome and suppressed trauma.
• She experiences further re-traumatization by a new partner’s rejection: “He put his hand literally in my face... ‘I don’t want to hear about it.’” (47:05)

10. Connecting with Other Survivors & Understanding the Larger System

• (47:06–50:00) Lisa connects with other survivors, uncovering the deeper scope of trafficking within the modeling world, implicating high-level agents, agencies, and celebrities.
• “There was kind of a sex trafficking ring going on in the modeling industry... That’s why I stood up in Congress.” (49:35)
• Lisa stresses the deliberate, piecemeal release of information by authorities and the extent of Epstein’s documentation (flight logs, surveillance).

11. Additional Betrayal & Power of Therapy

• (50:01–54:30) Lisa details a subsequent abusive relationship with a man who fetishized her victimization, leading to further betrayal and a crisis of trust.
• EMDR therapy becomes her turning point: “Once I owned it and I started talking about it, wow, the shame... it just falls away from you.” (54:18)

12. Empowerment, Advocacy, and Reclaiming Worth

• (54:31–56:35) Today, Lisa stands as an advocate, supporting survivors, speaking before Congress, and hosting survivor-focused platforms.
• She identifies the core of her healing: “You don’t have to be stuck in victim mode... It is my responsibility to understand why I’m making these choices... Even though some things may not be our fault, coming into this beautiful power that I’m coming into is also being responsible for all of it.” (54:55)
• Lisa’s closing message to survivors: “Know your worth. Nobody else defines it but you. And it’s not your fault.” (56:20)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Grooming & Control:
  “Going into that room with Jeffrey Epstein, I had liked the guy because he had spent hours talking to me and making me feel comfortable... He had worked me, so I was confused about him.” (20:00)

• On Exploitation’s Normalcy:
  “I saw a lot of very famous people doing a lot of drugs... agents at the time would give the models drugs... I had experienced sexual harassment quite a few times, and that’s something we would talk about with the other models... it was kind of just accepted.” (09:55–12:48)

• On Shame and Self-Blame:
  “That was probably the first time I felt like blaming myself completely, because maybe I was too flirty with him, maybe I deserved it... I just felt ashamed, major shame.” (21:44)

• On the System’s Complicity:
  “Katie Ford at that time was like, the owner of the biggest and best modeling agency. She was like, ‘I love Jeffrey...’ That was the validation I needed. And I was like, yeah, that was probably the turning point of kind of forgetting what happened.” (26:40)

• On Power & Responsibility:
  “It wasn’t my fault, it’s not your fault, but it is a responsibility... Not only for the relationship I’m in, for my children that I’m raising. It’s our responsibility.” (55:00)

• On Letting Go & Moving Forward:
  “The hardest part for me in therapy is having to admit I’m probably not going to get the love I desired from my parents and maybe even from a partner... Just letting go of that part of me.” (55:40)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Lisa’s background & early modeling career: 03:24–13:00
• Epstein island invitation, grooming & first assault: 13:00–20:15, 19:04–23:30
• Aftermath and second phase of abuse: 23:31–32:00
• Systemic trafficking, moving away: 32:01–38:30
• Suppression, motherhood, survival: 38:31–43:00
• Triggered by Epstein’s death & new abuse: 43:57–47:05, 50:01–54:30
• Connecting with survivors & advocacy: 47:06–50:00, 54:31–56:35

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Conclusion & Tone

Lisa’s story, told in her own voice, is both devastating and powerfully resilient. She explores childhood wounds, the layered traumas of exploitation, the complex manipulations of predators like Epstein, and the complicity of elite circles. Through therapy and speaking out, Lisa finds her power and advocates for others.

Her message to survivors is clear, inspiring, and hard-won:
“Know your worth. Nobody else defines it but you. And it’s not your fault... Once you can just own that, you really do step into a whole other level of power.” (56:20)

This episode offers deep insight into the psychology of abuse, the structural issues that enable it, and the path to reclaiming one’s self.

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Transcript

[Whit Misseldine]

Wonder plus subscribers can listen to exclusive episodes of this Is Actually Happening by joining Wonder in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.

This Is Actually Happening features real experiences that often include traumatic events. Please consult the Show Notes for specific content warnings on each episode and for more information about support services.

Hi listeners. Before we begin, I have a special announcement. This year we've been working on a limited edition illustrated book for this Is actually happening, featuring 10 of our most beloved storytellers with stunning illustrations and the full text of their stories. It's been a joy and a labor of love putting this together. Something beautiful, tangible and lasting for true fans of the show, and it makes for a meaningful holiday gift or a keepsake for yourself. The book will be available for pre order starting next week, and we'll make another announcement then with links to order, so stay tuned. But now on to today's episode what if you survived Jeffrey Epstein?

[Lisa Phillips]

When you're on an island, you are trapped. You can't go anywhere. And I don't know this person. I don't know what he's capable of. I don't know what he's actually going to do to me, how far it's going to go. I was frozen basically.

[Whit Misseldine]

From Wondery, I'm Wit Misseldine. You're listening to this Is actually Happening.

Episode 383 what if you survived Jeffrey Epstein?

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[Lisa Phillips]

My dad was born in New York and his family was from Jamaica. His father was half Jamaican, half Scottish and his mother was Norwegian. Jamaican. My mother was an Indian Jamaican born in Kingston. Had my brother in New York and then we moved to California and that's where they had me. After two months we moved to England. My sister was born in England and so that completed our family. So I basically grew up in England. My parents were hands on parents. My dad was adventurous. He would take us camping a lot and always introduce us to the wild outdoors. And he would raft soccer, I played soccer. I was a cheerleader, I was a dancer. I was into beauty pageants. I was super busy as a child when we lived overseas. My dad took us a lot to different countries and we were very cultured. And my mom was a stay at home mom and cooked a lot of really yummy food and she was a very good functional mother. And my parents, I think raised us really good with morals. And they're still married to this day. But my parents were kind of quiet. They didn't really have that many conversations with me. Not really, really figuring out who I was and what I really wanted. The parents always think they know better kind of thing. So emotionally I don't feel like my needs were met. I never really felt seen or loved in the way I needed. I was definitely loved in the way that I had, you know, anything I wanted and a roof over my head and all the cool clothes and all the friends and all the summer parties and all that stuff. I definitely had that amazing childhood. But I'm proud of you and I love you. Those words of affirmation that I feel like children really, really need, I didn't really get growing up. So in their minds, that's just great parenting. I definitely felt my parents were doing the best that they could, but I was missing that emotional love and caring and words of affirmation that I think I desperately needed. When I was about 10 or 11, my mother entered me into a pageant. I got Miss Congeniality. I always had this sparkling, like bubbly personality. I've always had it. Happy girl. And the modeling business was something I was obsessed with. I just, I looked up to like Sidney Crawford and wanted to be like Kate Moss and just I was obsessed, like a lot of young girls into fashion and I just wanted to be a model. And then I hit about 5ft 8 and a half at 13 years old. I was tall, I was really lanky. I was multicultural, multiracial, and very different from a lot of the kids. I want to be a model, an actress, be in the entertainment world. And my parents flew to New York at 16 years old, riding on the boat around the Hudson and doing a big photo shoot and meeting Nikki Taylor, who was huge. And, you know, I placed as a finalist in the big magazine contest and just, like, starting to get that confidence that, okay, I could do this. And after that big photo shoot, my family moved that summer to Belgium, where started working with a Mali agency in Amsterdam and Brussels. Once I graduated, I really wanted to dive deep into the lawing business, and I did. As far as the racial aspect of things, my mother is Indian, Jamaican. She's not considered black. And so when my father's mother's Norwegian and his dad is half black, half white, my mother and father never told me I was black. We talked about the identity of being West Indian, but I wasn't taught black culture. My father was at the Pentagon. You know, when I was, like, 13 or 14, I definitely felt different there than living in Europe. Race is very different over there. It's a really odd thing to talk about because people do see me as a woman of color, and I do see myself as a woman of color. But when you're not raised as a black woman or a woman of color, you just don't experience race the same way. Definitely when I left home and and lived in the States, I would just see on castings and auditions that, you know, you would go for a black girl or a mixed girl. So I started seeing the Divide as a young actress and model that was definitely typecast. After graduating high school, I really wanted to go where the modeling business was hot. That was Miami Beach, South Beach. This is the late 90s. I immediately got signed with a big agency in Miami and start working between Miami and Los Angeles at that time. And because of my personality and being mixed race, I think it was really popular at that time. There weren't that many of us like there is now. And I did tons and tons of TV commercials. I was like the Uptons girl, which is this big department store. And so people would recognize me as the Uptons girl, and I would do, like, small parts in movies. I was in Any Given Sunday with Oliver Stone. I started doing small parts in soap operas and just kept up the momentum of doing TV commercials. I felt like I was ready for New York City, and that's the big jump for most models, Paris and New York. So I signed with a pretty big agency in New York City and moved there. And I started working a lot. Back then, I was like the Catalog girl. A lot of our shoots were in the Caribbean and Hawaii and exotic places. I was living the dream. Like, I was, like, dating Billy Zane at that time, who was, you know, just came off a Titanic, and he was a lot of fun, and it was the coolest time. It really just was so much fun. I remember I was in Greece with my. My roomie, and she would just cry, like, every night because she missed her parents. And I remember looking at her like, what's your problem? Like, I don't get it. Like, I don't miss my parents at all, you know? And I realized it's because they never called me or they didn't email. And I didn't really hear from them that often. And I didn't really want to acknowledge how kind of alone I was. And also because of that, I didn't really have this sense of worth. And I know it was an underlying thing for me. When I was younger, I didn't date a lot with guys, or if I did, I didn't ever take them seriously. We hang out with Leonardo DiCaprio, you know, and a lot of those young actors and models during that time, you know, But I never felt worthy, you know, So I would hang out with them or go to dinners or I would go on a couple dates, but I never really felt worthy of their company in a way. So I always had this underlining feeling of, like, why aren't I worthy of having love? I would date really the most successful and fun men. And to this day, I think a lot of them are really great people, but I just wouldn't let them in. I didn't even know what that felt like, to actually be vulnerable and let someone into really who I was. I was just adored by the way that I looked in my body. And I knew that I knew everybody that approached me. It was just by the way that I looked. Nobody was really trying to get to know me. I was always wearing a mask. It wasn't really the true me. And so I felt really empty in those years. So how I fulfilled that void in my life was I just worked so hard at being successful, and I was very successful. I had everything that I wanted. I was making money. I had the career. I had these beautiful, beautiful friends and ambitious friends that I adored and looked up to. But you saw a lot of darkness, too. When I moved to New York, it was 1999, and I would hang out in these circles where we would go to these parties or after parties, you know, having a father who was an officer in the Air Force. I did have these morals, and I didn't do drugs during that time. But I would observe everything going on around me and felt like I was, like, maybe a little better than them because I wasn't indulging in all that. But I saw a lot of very famous people doing a lot of drugs. Even the agents at the time would give the models drugs. And a lot of darkness goes along with that. I had experienced sexual harassment quite a few times, and that's something that we would talk about with the other models. I knew other models that were made to do things with photographers. A lot of times we had voice this to our agencies, and they would say, oh, that's just how he is, or throw it away and be nonchalant about it. And it was kind of just almost, like, accepted. Like you just had to put up with it. Oliver Stone, on any given Sunday, groped me and put his hand right up my skirt. And I remember going, ah, like that. And everyone in the crew looking at me, you know, because I was so shocked that he did that. But I was, guess, supposed to stay quiet because I got fired the next day for having that reaction. Instead of being like, I started to learn that I needed to be quiet. And men were able to do what they wanted. Photographers, directors, producers. They were able to take advantage of their position. And I saw that. So my career is going really good. And we had booked a really big job. It was a cover of a magazine and a spread. One of the models, she was from Poland, and a photographer chose us. And both of us flew with the crew from New York to the little island of Tortola, which is next to St. Thomas. We did a few days of this photo shoot. It was really fun. And the crew. And I remember the photographer was really flirty and cute, but he was a young guy, maybe late 20s or 30s at the time. And, you know, he kind of had a little thing for me. So the next day we had a break. And the model said to me, oh, we have the day off. Let's go do something fun. I know this guy who owns an island nearby, and I already spoke to him, and he said he would send us a boat and we can go hang out there for the day. And I was just like, well, okay, if I think it's okay, we might as well go. And this photographer is, like, been hitting on me. And that photographer had actually crawled into bed with me the night before, and it was just so awkward. She gave me that out to, like, get away from the crew. If you're leaving me. I'm going with you, you know. So I was like, okay, let's go. The boat came. We got on the boat and we went over. We get there and this is gorgeous little island, you know, There was like a trampoline in the water. We were playing in the ocean and we met a couple young girls that was there. And we went to the pool and hung out at the pool and we just laughed. We kind of had a lot of fun. I had noticed that there was an older gentleman in the pool with one of the younger blondes that was there. They were all blonde. I was the only brunette. I was more of like the token mixed girl usually. So at that island, it didn't seem anything off to me. And the other young girls, I thought they were over 18. I was 22. I think the other girl that brought me was around 21, 22. But we all looked really young. There was an older gentleman, but being from the malling industry, there was a lot of older men with younger women and a lot of parties. And then we got ready for dinner and we went to this beautiful long table with all this beautiful seafood and fruit and was having a good time. And then another older gentleman walked up and he introduced himself as Jeffrey. And he sat down and I could tell that the other young girls looked up to him and thought kind of highly of him from the conversation. And he kind of focused on me. I was like the new girl there and started asking me questions about my background. And I think he realized kind of quickly that I was pretty cultured and well traveled and well spoken. And he started asking me some deeper questions. So as I was telling Jeffrey about my childhood, I let him know that I love lived in England for a few years in Oxford. My dad was in the air force. He was a navigator. And I was telling him about this interesting life, and he was like, oh, you. Do you want to meet a prince? And I'm like, yeah. And that's when that older gentleman that was in the pool walked up and I briefly met him and he shook his hand and he just, you know, walked away. So it was very brief, but I had always remember that, oh, I met a prince. And then he went on to ask me more about myself. You know, I shared with him that I had really big aspirations for myself. And he asked a lot of deeper questions that most men don't ask. And I liked that because I never really got that attention, that kind of attention from a man. It was more of a mentorship, fatherly type of attention. It didn't feel like he was attracted to me. So it's just a wonderful conversation that I felt good about. Like, wow, this is a fun trip. This beautiful island, this really charming older man. He was funny and attentive and made me feel good about myself. And I always remembered that. So at that time, we finished up dinner and we went back to our quarters and we got ready for bed. And the other girl and I were just sitting on the bed, just chatting. And then at that point, there was a knock at the door. And one of the other young girls, she stuck her head in and was like, jeffrey's ready for his massage. And the other girl was like, okay, well, we're going to do a massage. And I'm like, what are you talking about? And she just was like, well, you know, Jeffrey likes massages. It's just kind of this thing. We just kind of have to do it. And I'm like, well, you go ahead and go do it, you know? And she's like, it doesn't really work like that. Like, you're going to have to come with me. And I looked at the other girl there and I was like, do I have to go? And she's like, yeah. He said, both of you. I just said, well, he was a nice guy. I mean, this can't be that bad.

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[Lisa Phillips]

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[Lisa Phillips]

So I just went with her and we walked across the island over to his living quarters. And we went in. It was a bedroom and a massage table, and he was on the table just laying down naked. And he at that point was very talkative, you know, and then teaching you, like real massage techniques. There was oil. I mean, that went on for a while because he definitely wanted a real massage. And then as we got a little more comfortable, he just asked us to take our tops off. And I'm starting to feel uncomfortable. Like, what's going on? Her talk came off, my talk came off. We started to massage him and he turned over at that point to see us. And that interaction turned into an assault where he used a vibrator on us, made us do things. As he watched and play with himself, he changed in that moment. He wasn't the same man at dinner in the cheeky, giddy stuff with his little grin that he has. It wasn't like that. He definitely was in a moment of whatever that darkness that he has with young women. He went there. I. I get a reaction out of my body when I think, when I talk about it. I remember just being scared out of my mind and thinking to myself, like, I'm on a island. Like, I'm on an island. Like, I have to go along with this because what is going to do to us? I didn't know how bad it was going to go. He finished and then wrapped it up and I just looked at her like, come get out of here. And we just got out of there and like, I remember running back to the room. It was just the weirdest feeling of what the frick just happened to us. She was just like, it's okay. Just, it's okay. This is Jeffrey. This is what he likes. And I'm like, well, why didn't you tell me, like, why didn't you tell me before coming here? She's like, I didn't think that he was going to do this. I didn't think he was going to want to do that with you. You're not really his type. A lot of the girls were blonde, and they were definitely a type. And so she was. I think this is what she said was assuming that he wasn't going to want to do anything with me. Being on an island, people need to put themselves in these survivors. At Epstein's position, you really have to, because when you're on an island, you are trapped. You can't go anywhere. And I don't know this person. I don't know what he's capable of. I don't know what he's actually going to do to me, how far it's going to go. I was frozen, basically, and I never crossed my mind to run out the door. Like, where am I going to run to? Is he going to drag me back in? Am I going to swim in the ocean to the other island? Yeah, right. I was trapped on that island. And a lot of women could have these excuses and they're like, oh, you should have known better, you should have ran away, or I would never have done that. Like, trust me, I've heard everything. You have to think about the grooming process, because I was groomed for hours. Not just by him, by the other girls there. Going into that room with Jeffrey Epstein, I had liked the guy because he had spent hours talking to me and making me feel comfortable. It wasn't like I just arrived on the island and then he assaulted me in that type of way. He had worked me, so I was confused about him. That was the first experience that I'd had where I knew it was wrong and I had been taken advantage of. It was probably the first time that I felt like blaming myself completely because maybe I was too flirty with him. Maybe I deserved it. Like, I started thinking all these things in my head that I just felt ashamed. I had shame from it, major shame. I just laid in bed that night just looking up at the ceiling and not sleeping. I just looked at that ceiling and was just, like, scared to death that there was going to be another knock at the door and there was going to be round two or he was going to come into the room. I didn't know it was going to happen. But nothing happened. And as soon as the dawn broke, we got ready and we called for that boat and we were out there waiting for that boat. And we got on the boat and went back to our photo shoot. Finished up that photo shoot, and I went back to New York. There was a before Lisa and an after Lisa. And I know there was a distinct difference. I was successful, and I was working hard, and, well, I was growing in my success. I didn't abuse myself, but after that trip, I started to abuse myself. After that trip was different. When I would go out now, now I was like the others who were drinking or abusing drugs. I was in their world now. Because now I felt really worthless and full of shame. Now I was damaged. So three or four months would go by, and almost every day, I kid you not, Jeffrey Epstein's secretaries would call me, and they would have everything in the book to try to get me to go back and meet with him. Jeffrey thought you were amazing. Jeffrey thought you were really powerful. You know, Jeffrey really wants to help you with a career. You know, Jeffrey this, Jeffrey that tried to make an appointment for me to go to his Upper east side townhouse. And I just said, no, no, no. Like, to me, he was a rapist. Even though I still felt like I was. It was my fault in some ways. I just didn't want anything to do with that man. But then, this is the genius of Epstein. He called me up one day, he called me himself, and he said to me, like, lisa, I remember what you told me on the island. Your biggest dream. You wanted to be a 4 model. I'm really, really good friends with Katie Ford. And he said, I told her about you, and she wants to meet with you. Katie Ford at that time was, like, the owner of the biggest and best modeling agency and on the island. I had told him, when he asked me, what's your biggest dream? What's your. Your big ambition right now? And I told him, I, I am going to be a 4 model. That's what I'm working towards. And I was just like, wow, maybe he's not a bad guy. Like, he wants to help me. And my thinking was, okay, maybe it's my fault, you know? And I agreed. And I went to go meet with Katie Ford at Ford Models, went into that beautiful iconic building, and I checked in, and I said, lisa Phillips, I'm here to see Katie Ford. And she was like, yeah, she's expecting you. You can go on in. And went into Katie's office. I said, I'm Lisa. I'm here to meet with you. And she was like, I love Jeffrey. Like, Jeffrey's amazing. That was the validation I needed. And I was like, yeah, that was probably the turning point of kind of forgetting what happened in the island. And I started thinking, he's a good guy, and I became a Ford model. So when I was introduced to Ford models and I became a Ford model, now I was kind of like one of Katie's and the higher agents girls. So they had a lot of charity events, dinner parties, and I was always invited to them. So now I'm in this world of feeling kind of special. Not only am I a model and hanging around, you know, the most important people in the modeling industry. For the next couple years, I worked as a 4 model, and it was great. I built my career, started acting, taking acting lessons, and started doing more smaller roles and tons of TV commercials. So my career was going pretty good. It was very quickly after I started hanging out with Katie and going to some dinner parties and things like that. Jeffrey was at some of those parties, so I knew that they knew each other pretty well. And then after, you know, I'd gotten in with four models, Jeffrey called me to come and see him. And I just thought, wow, you know, know, the mentor apart is back. And that was just on the island. But when I went to go see him, he absolutely did mentor me. He did talk to me a lot about my career, you know, being this, like, cheeky person. You would hear him on the phone with very important people, world leaders and princes. And there was only a certain time that he would say, you know, you're not to mention anyone that you met or saw on the island. He only mentioned that to me once. He only had to say it one time. And I knew not to say anything. It was always like, business and mentorship and made you feel really good, like someone really cared about you. But after I went back to see him, he said, well, it's time for a massage again. And that's when my heart sank, because I was like, oh, crap, is this really gonna happen again? Because now I was all by myself. When I said, okay, I've gotta go. I'm casting or whatever. And I was getting ready to leave, he was like, oh, no, no, no, we're gonna do a massage first. Took me into the room, and of course, it's a real massage again. And then eventually the massage turns into another abuse. And you could say, oh, she's stupid. Like, why so naive? Like, I wouldn't have went back as someone who abused me. But I knew that he had the control to put me with the top Molly, you see, the control to take me out of there. He could easily call in to say, lisa's done. So Lisa felt like she had to just go along with whatever he was doing. And he was good. He wasn't just introducing me to this. He would say, you know, I have a really great friend. He's a director, you know, in Hollywood. He's holding audition, and it's a big movie. And he was really a big director with a big movie. And he would. He would say, okay, I'm gonna fly you there. I would get on an airplane with, fly to Los Angeles and meet with this director. Jeffrey helped me with getting into nyu. He paid for some of my acting classes. He was starting to really believe in me and help me. And I could see with my friends that were meeting him during that time, he was doing major things for them. I didn't learn till many years later that they were being abused in the same way. The girls that he had around him, trusted him, looked up to him. Of course they were being abused by him, but they would never speak about him. Ill. Nobody spoke about it. I didn't even speak about it because I was too, like, ashamed to say, is he doing that to you too? They would never tell each other what was going on. Jeffrey had called me one night after a movie premiere and told me to go to this after party. And I showed up there with some friends. Katie Ford was there with some models. And there was a celebrity that would not leave me alone. He was, like, all over me. And I kept saying, leave me alone. Like, you're gross. I was in my early 20s. He was probably, I don't know, 60 at the time. He was old. But Jeffrey had told me to go to that party. Why was that man all over me? Katie took me to another party, which ended up being a hotel suite that this man lived in in the Upper east side. The same man that was all over me. And I'm like, why are we here? And I went into the bathroom, and when I came out of the bathroom, like, composed myself, like, figure out how to get the heck out of there. Everybody was gone, and I was all by myself. And this man assaulted me. I'm just like, what? What is going on here? I remember another time where I was in the agency and an agent was like, oh, I had a friend that was in. And they were looking through the comm cards, and they were picked you out? And they were like, I'd love to go out with her. And so they set me up on a blind date. It was the only blind date I'd ever been on. But I trusted my Agents. And this man picks me up our memories in this nice Range Rover. And he rolls the window down. I walk up like, hi. And I was like, wait a second, Are we gonna pick up your son? And he was like, no, you're here to go out with me. And I'm like, but what? Like, this doesn't make sense. Like, how old are you? You know, he was a senator and a very nice man. Okay, I went on the date with him. He was a very nice man. But, like, why was I in my 20s going out with a man? Blind date through Ford models. And he was in his 60s. He took me to a dinner party where I sat next to beautiful dinner party, all politicians and wealthy people on the Upper east side. And I was sitting next to Al and Tippy Gore. And here this guy waltz in with a girl way younger than him. And white guy, mixed race girl. Like, it was just so odd. So the stuff that Jeffrey was doing, inviting us to parties, and there was older men. It wasn't that much different from the women. And Ghislaine Maxwell was around during that time. I saw the woman. I had met her. There was so many weird things going on between 2000 and 2003. My girlfriend called me up one day and she said, you need to come over right now. And so I rushed over there, and she's like, you don't know who Jeffrey is? And I'm like, what are you talking about? She was like, there's something dark going on here. She was, like, crying and, like, so, like, messed up. And she's like, jeffrey made me go into a room, have sex with a guy. I'm like, what do you mean he made you? And she was like, oh, he made me go do that. She told me who he was. And I'm thinking, oh, my God, that's who I saw on the island the first time I was there, who was a prince. She said, it was the same prince. And I was like, oh, my God, are you serious? This is crazy. And so we started calling other people who knew him and asking questions like, what's he doing with you? And like, wow. And so we started figuring things out, and we started getting really scared about who this man was. We started realizing it wasn't about Jeffrey. It was about all these other men that we were made to meet that would attempt assaults on us. Or sometimes it just flat out happened. I remember he had told me when I asked him, why are all these cameras around? Why are there always cameras around? And he said, well, I like to have things on People. And so it started to make sense to me. The years that I knew Jeffrey when I was in town and he knew I was in town, he definitely demanded that I come and see him. And every situation was a good 45 minutes to an hour of speaking to me. First of going over, you know, my aspirations, what I was working on. He would give me great advice. He would let me in on little secrets of things that I still hold to this day. He always would end. I could say always, because it was always. Every time I went, he would end things by the massage. And it was always he needed a massage. It was a real massage. But every time, it turned into a session where he would want to use things on me. And he wasn't soft either. He was kind of aggressive, and he had this change of face. It just was a different Jeffrey. The one that you feared. That was the one you feared. I do know that Jeffrey had sex with a lot of the younger girls. I think his thing was the underage girls. He never penetrated me in that room, and he just always wanted to finish. It was like his whole goal was to finish. And I think he did that six to eight times a day with different girls. How disgusting is that? But I knew a lot more today than I did then. All I knew was the way he was was very close to how a lot of people were back then. So I didn't really understand it until my girlfriend told me he made her go and have sex with someone. That was a turning point. Like, he never said to me, go in that room and have sex with him. Like, make me do it where I feel so fear, I go do it me. It was like a roundabout way. Oh, you want to meet this director? Okay, I'm gonna send you to go meet with him. Them. I just thought that's the way things worked. I was not that type of girl that was trafficked in that way where it's like, you're made to go have sex with these people. When I started finding out about Jeffrey, I started to really, really fear him and started to really focus on that Jeffrey that was behind closed doors in the massage room and not the Jeffrey that was pretending to like me and adore me and support me. And I think it was just all a facade just to get what he wanted out of me. The last time I saw him, and I was going to make it the last time I saw him because of what my girlfriend told me, I just told him straight up, and I know you did, to my friend, and he didn't like that. I said that to him. I just got a very, very, very different Jeffrey that day. And he probably knew that he was going to get anything out of me anymore. And I said, I didn't like that you called me to meet with this old ass celebrity musician. Why would you do that? And he had called me to meet with him and Ghislaine. And I was like scared to death of Ghislaine. Cause she was very creepy back then. And that was the darkest I saw Jeffrey. Because Jeffrey took me into the massage room and something very horrible happened. And I. I just won't speak about what happened, but he tried to show me that you're going to be quiet, you're not going to say anything. So I left. And I left in a lot of fear that day. And I never went back. Within a month, I had packed up my New York City apartment and moved across the country to Los Angeles. I didn't want to leave New York City. My career was at its height. But I picked up and I left and I moved to Four Models in Los Angeles. And I got away. So it's 2004. I moved across the country. I felt like I was free of Jeffrey. And in a lot of ways I was. Because he was starting to get exposed. At the time the Vanity Fair article had come out, he was a lot more paranoid. The way that Jeffrey was treating the young girls at the time was escalating. He was definitely being much more exposed. And typical Jeffrey fashion. I got a phone call a month after I left my agent saying I had a casting for the Victoria's Secret show, which was huge at the time. I was like, oh my gosh, that's so exciting. But once I got the details for it, I was like, oh, shit, Jeffrey's probably behind this. Jeffrey had his hand in Tory's secret, and that was his thing. He was tell a lot of the girls. I can get you into Tory's secret. He does these to silence you, to have that control and power over you. So I remember telling my agents at that time, like, I'm. I'm not ready. I'm not gonna go this year. And so I just skipped it. Who does that? Nobody skips them. Toy secret show. That was the last time I heard from Jeffrey that completed my story with him. During those years, 2004, 2005, I just, you know, I was dating in Los Angeles and still these same type of like, narcissistic man, you know, in the industry. People I felt really safe to be around, that I didn't really have to have these deeper conversations with and have a real relationship with. I kind of just avoided it. I have one really great guy from 2004 to 2005 that I dated onnoth. Still to this day, I still look at him and think, you know, he was a great guy. You're the one who got away. But I never felt really worthy of him back then. So I kind of always, like, dated him and liked him and then let him go. And so I felt like I was a little screwed up back then and not really knowing my worth. I went out with that guy one night, and I was in Malibu, and I was introduced to Daryl Hannah. She was dating, like, this younger guy at the time, and he just became my really good friend. I ended up getting in a relationship with him and then getting pregnant. And then I decided with his family was a Christian family. And I decided because I was pregnant that maybe that was the best time to leave kind of this world and have a baby and get married and just suppress the life I was living. And I got married in 2006, five months pregnant, had a beautiful child, and spent the next few years really, really alone in my marriage. And that guy struggled a lot with being a father. And I was literally the one still working, taking care of this child. And so the marriage really didn't last. And by then we had two kids. I mean, we're friends these days, and we raised our kids to this day. But there was no vulnerability, There was no deep talks, and there was no way of me opening up. I would never say in a million years about anything with Jeffrey Epstein. And he started getting exposed during those years. And I remember at one point he was like, your name is in the Little Black book. Is that you? And I'm like, oh, no, no, it's not me. You know, and just glazed over it. And I was never going to expose anything back then. And he definitely wasn't the right person to do that. We just didn't have that relationship, and I couldn't be vulnerable. And maybe I wasn't even ready either. Maybe that's why I chose someone who was so cold. He was so much like my dad. My dad was cold. He was cold. And I would just choose these men that I didn't have these deeper connections to. Ford Models says, well, come back to New York. You can be a Ford model. Models in the 30s do really well. And so my parents and my sister at the time helped me to leave this man. And with, like, two young kids under 4, moved to New York City. And when I Left my husband and I moved to New York City. I found out I was pregnant. So the last time I was with my husband one time it took me because we were not sleeping together. Three kids by the same man and he wasn't taking care of his two other kids. And here I am, went through custody and divorce and found myself all on my own, started working again. And so I started this model scouting business where I could work with all the contacts that I had in the malling industry. So I became this kind of really big scout. I would find talent, nurture them, and then I would place them with big agencies. And I became very successful at this. And so for those seven years, I did not date anybody. This actually was the best years I my life. Those seven years living in Park Slope, Brooklyn. It was just me and these three little babies and they were beautiful boys. They were so good, loving. I just remember being in the bed with all old em. I was by myself and I felt like I was doing so much work on myself. You know, I read so many books, I went to seminars, I had mentors that I would meet with every Sunday. And I just felt like I was really working on myself and going into that healing process. But I never, never went into what happened to me in the early 2000s. It was like it didn't even exist. So I never went there. But I worked on all those things that I thought was wrong with me. You know, I can't have a good relationship, you know, but I just focused on being the best mother that I. Oh, hello. Hello.

[Raza Jaffrey]

Scary story time. The joys of analog media.

[Tommy Alters]

Be kind.

[Raza Jaffrey]

Rewind.

[Lisa Phillips]

Never mind.

[Raza Jaffrey]

You're here for this special collection. Welcome to Radio Rental. The scariest stories you've ever heard in your life, all told by real people. O and off we go.

[Lisa Phillips]

All I could see was the devil's mask he was wearing.

[Lindsey Graham]

This wasn't a human being that I saw.

[Lisa Phillips]

There's something here in this house.

[Lindsey Graham]

Something out of this world.

[Lisa Phillips]

There was a woman moving through the hall. I stepped back and I was completely.

[Audible Advertiser]

Alone in the hallway.

[Raza Jaffrey]

Radio Rental is available now listen for free on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever.

[Lisa Phillips]

You get your podcasts.

[Lindsey Graham]

In the fall of 1620, a battered merchant ship called the Mayflower set sail across the Atlantic. It carried 102 men, women and children, risking it all to start again in the new world. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of American History Tellers. Every week we take take you through the moments that shaped America. And in our latest season, we explore the untold story of the Pilgrims, one that goes far beyond the familiar tale of the first Thanksgiving. After landing at Cape Cod, the Pilgrims forged an unlikely alliance with the Wampanoag people, who helped the Pilgrims survive the most brutal winter they'd ever known, laying the foundation for a powerful national myth. But behind that story lies another one of conflict, betrayal, and brutal violence against the very people who helped the pilgrim survive. Follow American Historytellers on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of American Historytellers the Mayflower early and ad free right now on Wondery Plus.

[Lisa Phillips]

In 2017, December of 2017, I moved to Laguna Beach, California, and got my kids in school and started living just a really cute little life there and. And loved it. But, like, maybe it's time for you to date and I'm ready to meet someone and blend our families. I'm really looking for a man that has children, and I chose this man, and my kids liked him. Then I moved in 2019 to another area of Los Angeles, and I blended my family with this really nice, nice guy. Madly in love with this guy. This is the first time I ever fell in love, the first time that I ever felt like this is someone that I wanted to be with for the rest of my life. And then what happens in 2019, right? In August, right when I move in, I'm sitting on the couch with this guy. I saw it on this TV screen. Jeffrey had allegedly commit suicide. And when I saw it, I just started crying and I just, like, started, like, hyperventilating. I'm just like, all this, like, shame and all this stuff poured out of me. I didn't know how to handle that. And I just burst into tears. And I know the guy that I was with at the time looked at me like, are you okay? Like, what is going on here? And I just ran into the bedroom and just started crying. And, I mean, maybe he looked and he saw it could put two and two together, and maybe he didn't want to deal with it, I don't know. But he never came to me and he never wanted to know what was going on. And I kind of needed someone to say, hey, what's going on? You want to talk about it? Like, obviously something went on. I started really thinking about Epstein, and then I kind of knew in my heart that he hadn't committed suicide. I just knew that he had been murdered or something horrible, horrible had happened. And I was really confused about it. What's interesting about it is when you've been groomed Jeffrey manipulated me to think he was a really great guy. That's what he had to do to abuse me. And remember, I had suppressed the abuse for so many years. I never talked about it, right? So when he died, all I focused was on, oh my. He was a mentor. He was good for that moment. But slowly after time, I had to really start thinking about that other side of Jeffrey. But I didn't want to. To go there. It wasn't. I didn't want to go there. I had to find someone to speak to about it, to go there. I mean, you would think the partner, the man you're going to spend the rest of your life with, you think is going to be that person to open up to. But we didn't really have that relationship. Like my parents, I explained in the beginning. He also never really told me about his life prior. When I would ask him, like my parents, he would never open up to me. Like it was the same relationship. I'm still choosing my dad and my parents and the relationship. But I was starting to be ready finally to open up. I said to him, honey, like, I really want to tell you something. Do you remember how I reacted the other night when that man died? He just said, I don't want to talk about it. And I was like, well, I. I want to tell you what happened to me. And he put his hand literally in my face like this, like right in my face, and was like, I don't want to hear about it. You know, you're a playboy or whatever you were into back then, like, I want to hear about was like the worst slap. It was almost like he punched me in my face or my stomach. I was literally like out of breath thinking, what is he shaming me right now? Like, I wanted to tell him like, the, what the abuse that he was doing to me and, and just talk about it. He didn't even let me get there. So at that point I was like, oh, really? I guess I'm just worthless. Like, I just, I. The person I love, like, I can't even tell you anything about me. I wanted to be vulnerable in that moment. And I was shut down. So once I was shut down, I didn't have the same love for him anymore. And I started going through therapy and being like, Lisa, you gotta let out the bad and the ugly part of it. And that's why I started reaching out to the survivors, the younger ones. They were the over 18, the 18 to 24 in New York, and they were the underage, the. The 13, 14 to 17 and Florida that Ghislaine was getting for him. So there were different types, but the abuse, once I started talking to them was exactly the same. It was always a massage that turned into abuse. It took time for me to get to the point where I started talking about my story. In the beginning, I'm talking about for a good nine months to a year, I was talking about everyone else's story to support their story. I wasn't really saying what happened to me, but it was a really good time for me as I started to get to know so many survivors. This went on 2020, 2021, and people started telling me, Katie Ford and Faith, Kate's home next, and Jean Luc Brunel and all these agents kind of all worked together. And there was kind of a sex trafficking ring going on in the malling industry at the time. As her learning about it, getting mad about it, that she was sending me to these parties or taking these young girls for a reason, like Jeffrey was. That's the reason why I speak out. I want you to understand the big picture of things. That's why I stood up in Congress. These people have so much power over all of us and we're getting little tidbits, little tidbits here and there, oh, little teasers. But now they know the whole big picture. Jeffrey had cameras everywhere. Jeffrey had the flight logs. They have all the information that they've seen it all, but they just don't want to explain, expose it all. So they do little bits and bits. I get it, but let's stop playing games. So when I spoke out in 2020 and when I was on these documentaries, I would get a lot of mail or emails from men. And I always thought it was odd. Like, I'm talking about being abused and now you're attracted to me. There was so many men that reached out. I mean, I'm talking about hundreds that reached out to me, wanting to get to know me or date me. And I just thought it was really, really odd. But there was this one particular man who was from Boston, and he was like, blonde hair, blue eye. He was kind of like my type. He was successful in commercial real estate. And he reached out as a friend and he said he was a good Christian man. He was just like, I'm a Christian man, I have a faith and I hear his story and I just feel for you. And I just kind of overlooked the fact that he saw me in a documentary. We became very close friends and I broke up with the guy that I had been living with. And I started dating this man pretty quickly after when we started to get romantic. We took our time, and the night that it was supposed to happen, we were supposed to be romantic with each other. Everything changed in his eyes. Like he wasn't the nice Christian man anymore. He basically told me that he got off on the fact that I was a victim of Epstein. He was obsessed with Epstein. Then he tried to choke me and spit on me and said, like, I want you to be my wife and I'll take care of you and your kids. Expose all this stuff to me. He was very honest. So I was like, what the. What are you talking about? I've been telling you for five months how I was abused by Epstein. And that's exactly what he told me he wanted to do with me. He would read devotionals to me every night. He, like, was this fake Christian, super fake. He owned a church in Boston. He was like this well known Boston, like, personality, and he just completely fooled me. It was the worst relationship of my life. I lost all faith in men at that point. So here I'm thinking I'm like 40 years old now, thinking, wow, I am pretty stupid. I was super naive. Like, how am I so easy to be manipulated and groomed by these men? I know there's lots of good men out there. I know that I have met a lot of good men out there. Unfortunately, I didn't choose a good one. And so I just said, you know what, Lisa? You've got to really go deeper. So what I did was I went into EMDR therapy. Like I said before, there was the Lisa before the abuse on Epstein island, and there was the Lisa after. And I don't think I found myself to the Lisa before until after EMDR therapy. That, to me, was the biggest turning point of my life. EMDR went into a part of myself that I had suppressed or never even looked at. I didn't even want to know that it even existed. It's painful. That's why a lot of people just stay in victim mode and, you know, blame everything on everybody else. But what EMDR therapy taught me was it wasn't my fault, it's not your fault, but it is a responsibility. It is my responsibility to understand why I'm making these choices too. Making it my responsibility is me going to therapy, like, what's triggering me, like, really thinking about how I can be the best person that I can be. Not only for the relationship that I'm in, for my children that I'm raising. It's our responsibility. And even though some Things may not be our fault. Coming into this beautiful power that I'm coming into is also being responsible for all of it. You don't have to be stuck in victim mode for the people who actually embrace the fact that it's your responsibility to own it. Even the good, the bad, the ugly. I had to really own the ugly. I really had to own that. But once I owned it and I started talking about it, wow, the shame. Shame just falls away. I mean, it just, it just falls away from you. And once I could just get rid of that shame that always followed me around, it followed me around until 2023. My own mother text me, I'm ashamed of you. When I had the falling out with that man from Boston, my mother took his side because, you know, he's a, he was a master manipulator. And she fell for it too. It was only after going through that year of therapy, I'm still in it. I still go twice a week to get to this powerful place where I am now. But I had to go into my childhood and I didn't understand that. I would always think a lot of it came from Epstein in the malling industry. But I had to go deep into my childhood to understand self loathing or not feeling good enough. Not having that self worth that I really, really needed was from there. And I'm worthy of love. Took a while. It built up to me, oh, you're worthy of a really, really good, incredible love. And once that kicked in, about a year ago, maybe nine months ago, it really kicked in. I made better choices. I had boundaries. I also had to get rid of friends and family that weren't supporting me. And I knew for many, many years they weren't on my side. The hardest part for me in therapy is having to admit that I'm probably not going to get the love that I desired from my parents and maybe even from a partner. Just letting go of that part of me that didn't get the love that she wanted. I didn't get it. And that's okay. Sometimes my therapist is right under your nose. Look around you. Look at the people who really are there for, for you and are really supporting you. They're there. And that's what I started doing. Just building a different network. I had to be more open to a different type of love instead of chasing the love that I think that I wanted. I like living in this power, just speaking out in front of Congress. That hearing was a movement. It was special to me. I'm also on a podcast interviewing these other survivors. I really want to get to the voice of the survivor out there and give them that platform where they feel empowered and inspired and beautiful. We've empowered each other and we have these beautiful stories to tell. And through healing of other stories, you heal yourself. I do want people to know anybody listening just to know your worth. Nobody else defines it but you. And it's not your fault. If you're listening and you're a survivor, it's not your fault. Once you can just own that, you really do step into a whole other level of power.

[Whit Misseldine]

Today's episode featured Lisa Phillips. If you'd like to reach out to Lisa, you can find her email, socials and website in the show Notes.

From Wondery. You're listening to this Is Actually Happening. If you love what we do, please rate and review the show. You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music or on the Wondery app to listen ad free and get to access access to the entire back catalog. In the episode notes you'll find some links and offers from our sponsors. By supporting them, you help us bring you our show for free. I'm your host Whit Misseldine. Today's episode was co produced by me and Andrew Waits, with special thanks to the this Is Actually Happening team, including Ellen Westberg. The opening music features the song Sleep Paralysis by Scott Velasquez. You can join the community on the this Is Actually Happening discussion group on Facebook or follow us on Instagram Actually Happening on the show's website thisisactually happening.com you can find out more about the podcast. Contact us with any questions, submit your own story or visit the store where you can find this Is Actually Happening designs on stickers, T shirts, wall art, hoodies and more. That's thisisactually happening.com and finally, if you'd like to become an ongoing supporter of what we do, go to patreon.com happening even 2 to $5 a month goes a long way to support our vision. Thank you for listening.

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[Raza Jaffrey]

I'm Raza Jaffrey and in the latest season of the Spy who, we open the file on Morton Storm, the spy who lived inside Al Qaeda. Unfulfilled with his life in a notorious Danish biker gang, Morton Storm is lost One afternoon, he stumbles into a library looking for answers. He finds them in the form of a book about Islam. The towering ginger haired Dane doesn't know it yet, but that moment will hurl him into a world of radicalism and see him rise through the ranks of militant Islamist organization Al Qaeda, only to suffer a huge crisis of faith. He turns from devotee to spy, tasked with rooting out some of Al Qaeda's most feared generals. The the CIA and MI5 bid for his allegiance as he loses himself in a life of cash laden suitcases, double crosses and betrayal. Follow the Spy who on the Wondery app or wherever you listen to podcasts. Or you can binge the full season of the Spy who Lived Inside Al Qaeda early and ad free with Wondery.