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Axel Dumas, an heir to one of Europe’s biggest fortunes, said Jeffrey Epstein met with him once despite the Frenchman’s efforts to avoid him.
Speaking with reporters on Hermès International SCA’s results call Thursday, Dumas, the luxury goods company’s executive chairman, said he met with Epstein in March 2013 when the disgraced financier came with a group, including Woody Allen, to visit the Birkin bag maker’s workshop on the outskirts of Paris. Epstein’s participation wasn’t planned, he said.
“He crashed the party,” Dumas said.
A photo in the mass of files made available on the US Justice Department’s website shows the three men at the workshop. Dumas’ name also features in a few of the files.
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Dumas said he had turned down several requests from Epstein for a meeting. In 2012, Hermès was asked to decorate Epstein’s jet and the company refused, he said. At the time, Hermès was in the middle of a battle to fend off a hostile takeover bid from LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE.
“I was a young leader at the time, in the middle of the LVMH affair,” Dumas said, adding that he believes he was a target of Epstein.
“Epstein already had a despicable reputation,” the executive said.
Dumas said he was “already suspicious of the actings of Eric Freymond,” the late wealth adviser to his family member Nicolas Puech, who was in the middle of a dispute over his stake in Hermès.
“I didn’t need another dodgy financier” lurking around, Dumas said.
By Angelina Rascouet
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