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Melinda French Gates told CBS This Morning that she "had nightmares" after one meeting with Jeffrey Epstein.
In discussing her split from Bill Gates, French Gates said that one of the contributing factors to their divorce was her ex-husband's ties with Epstein, The Daily Beast reported.
"It was many things," French Gates said. "But I did not like that he'd had meetings with Jeffrey Epstein. I made that clear to him."
French Gates told Gayle King she met Epstein "exactly one time, because I wanted to see who this man was. And I regretted it from the second I stepped in the door."
"He was abhorrent. He was evil personified. I had nightmares about it afterward. So my heart breaks for these young women," she added.
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French Gates and Gates announced in May 2021 they were splitting up after 27 years of marriage. When their divorce became public, it was revealed that French Gates had been seeking a divorce since 2019 after Gates' ties to convicted sex offender Epstein came to light, Insider previously reported.
Epstein completed suicide in jail in August 2019, just weeks after he was arrested on sex-trafficking charges. Prosecutors alleged in their complaint against Epstein that he ran a sex-trafficking operation from at least 2002 to 2005, targeting girls as young as 14.
Following Epstein's death, investigators turned their focus to Epstein's longtime girlfriend and associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, who was found guilty on several sex-trafficking charges at a trial in December.
However, that conviction is now up in the air after a juror revealed that he used his personal experience of sexual abuse to convince fellow jurors to trust the testimony of the accusers who spoke against Maxwell at the trial. Maxwell's legal team is asking for a new trial, but the judge said she wouldn't decide on the matter until the juror could be questioned in court. That hearing is scheduled to take place next week.
