The Filipinos in Epstein's Inner Circle

The surprisingly central role of the Philippines in Epstein's crimes

At least one Filipino, Jojo Fontenella (sic), who repeatedly made trips funded by Jeffrey Epstein back home to the Philippines, is named on Epstein’s “inner circle” list, which is partially redacted. But there were two Filipinos in Epstein’s inner circle if we believe child sex trafficking victim Jennifer Araoz whose 2019 lawsuit named Jojo’s wife Rosalyn “Lynn” Fontanilla as a close Epstein co-conspirator.

Lynn, a migrant worker from the Philippines, posted these photos on Facebook touring friends and family in what appears to be Epstein’s New York residence where she worked as a maid.

Lynn, who is also Filipino and traveled to the Philippines while employed as Epstein’s housekeeper at his New York City residence, was accused of working in concert with Epstein to “directly facilitate” his sex buying and sex trafficking ring, which included supplying “dozens if not hundreds” of women and girls, three girls a day, for paid sex acts with Epstein himself (Araoz vs. Kahn, 2019). Lynn is described as leading the victim to and stocking the rape room (“massage room”) with towels and supplies. On Jojo’s part, he is described in the files as Epstein’s driver and, in one July 2017 e-mail exchange, appears to have transported at least one minor girl.

The couple may have been live-ins at Epstein’s residence at 9 East 71st Street. According to public records, another previous address of the Fontanillas’ was 301 E 66th St Apt 5p NY, NY 10065. According to Epstein’s personal chef David Richard Mullen, this matches the address where several of the “young females” from Spain and Russia lived who traveled with Epstein.

Lynn apparently died of cancer in October 2016.

The Inner Circle List Part II

E-mail from Epstein’s executive assistant Lesley Groff. Jojo remains with Epstein after Lynn’s death and is described as driving a girl to her favorite grocery store.

“Talaga big time pala ang amo mo.” (Your boss must be really big time). Photos still up on the Fontanillas’ shared Facebook account.

Epstein stacked his entire household management and housekeeping staff with Filipino nationals, often in husband-wife pairs like the Fontanillas. The primary people who saw who was coming in and out of his residences and people who cleaned up after rape, child sexual abuse, sex trafficking and sex buying appear from the files to be be almost all Filipino. Epstein regularly paid for their trips back home to the Philippines. Some emails related to this are cryptic and concerning, e.g., a strange e-mail, sender unknown, saying“X should remain in the Philippines” to which Epstein replied “monster.”

There are also documents in the files of Epstein and Filipino employees wiring money to the Philippines. Recruiting employees from this one particular country was no accident. The Philippines is the world’s largest supplier of migrant household servants because labor export programming has been an official development strategy of the government post-colonization. In 2024, Filipino remittances back home amounted to 8.7 per cent of GDP, which is the highest among the Southeast Asian economies. Overseas Filipino workers have little to no recourse abroad for workplace violence and face crushing economic pressure to support their family back home. Using Filipinos for his deeds behind closed doors created a layer of protection for Epstein similar to victimizing young girls and women from impoverished communities.

The Fontanillas with Epstein.

The Fontanillas with Prince Andrews, who is also in the Epstein files making a deal in the Philippines with Filipino oligarch “RVO” Robert “Bobby” Ongpin.

Epstein continued to use Filipinos to facilitate and cover up his crimes. He turned to the digital political disinformation industry in the Philippines to scrub the internet of his abuses, and to continue his crimes, after his 2008 including his arrest for “soliciting a minor for prostitution.”

More information to come as it’s analyzed.