NEW YORK — Former Abercrombie & Fitch CEO Michael Jeffries, his romantic associate and a 3rd man have been arrested Tuesday on intercourse trafficking and interstate prostitution costs, a spokesperson for federal prosecutors stated.
Particulars of the prison costs weren’t instantly obtainable. They comply with sexual misconduct allegations, made in civil lawsuits and the media, from younger individuals who stated Jeffries lured them with guarantees of modeling work after which pressed them into intercourse acts.
Jeffries’ lawyer, Brian Bieber, stated by e-mail he would “reply intimately to the allegations after the indictment is unsealed, and when applicable, however plan to take action within the courthouse — not the media.”
Jeffries and his associate, Matthew Smith, have been arrested in Florida and have been as a result of make an preliminary courtroom look Tuesday afternoon in West Palm Seaside. Co-defendant James Jacobson was arrested in Wisconsin; there was no speedy data on a courtroom look.
Info on attorneys for Smith and Jacobson wasn’t instantly obtainable.
Brooklyn-based U.S. Lawyer Breon Peace and FBI and police officers have been set to carry a information convention later Tuesday.
Jeffries turned CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch in 1992 and left in 2014. The New Albany, Ohio-based firm declined to touch upon his arrest.
One lawsuit filed in New York final yr accused Abercrombie of permitting Jeffries to run a sex-trafficking group throughout his 22-year tenure. It stated that Jeffries had modeling scouts scouring the web for victims, and that some potential fashions turned sex-trafficking victims.
Abercrombie final yr stated it had employed an out of doors regulation agency to conduct an impartial investigation after a report on comparable allegations was aired by the BBC.
The BBC investigation included a dozen males who described being at occasions involving intercourse acts they stated have been staged by Jeffries and Smith, typically at his residence in New York and inns in London, Paris and elsewhere. The BBC report described Jacobson as a intermediary who recruited males for the occasions.
When the lawsuit was filed in New York final yr, Bieber declined to touch upon the allegations.
Abercrombie & Fitch traces its roots to a searching and outside items retailer that was based in 1892. By the point Jeffries arrived a century later, the model was a retail also-ran.
He was credited with reworking it right into a darling of turn-of-the-millennium teen mall tradition, recognized for its nouveau-preppy aesthetic — and for some controversy surrounding it. Jeffries alienated some clients by speaking about how the corporate went after enticing children who might match into its garments.
After the 2008 monetary disaster and subsequent recession, A&F’s recognition began to fade once more. By the point Jeffries left, a hedge fund had pushed the corporate’s board to interchange him due to the corporate’s lagging efficiency.
However the firm has rebounded lately.
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