26 October 2024, 00:25 | Updated: 26 October 2024, 00:30
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The former boss of fashion giant Abercrombie & Fitch has pleaded not guilty sex trafficking and prostitution charges in New York.
Ex-chief executive Mike Jeffries, 80, his partner Matthew Smith, 61, and a third man, James Jacobson, 71, were arrested in the US on Tuesday morning after being charged with one count of sex trafficking and 15 counts of interstate prostitution.
Jeffries, who was Abercrombie & Fitch chief executive from 1992 to 2014, denied the charges at the federal courthouse in Central Islip, Long Island, on Friday. Jacobson also planned to plead not guilty, his lawyer said. No date has been set for Smith.
If convicted of the sex trafficking charge, the defendants face a maximum sentence of life imprisonment and a mandatory minimum of 15 years.
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Jeffries is free on a 10 million dollar (£7.2 million) bond and will be back in court on December 12.
Announcing charges earlier this week, a prosecutor said Jeffries used his “power, his wealth and his influence to traffic men for his own sexual pleasure and that of his romantic partner, Matthew Smith”.
Breon Peace, US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said Jacobson allegedly engaged in “try-outs with men across the world”, after which Smith would “personally approve” them.
The men were then allegedly flown to Jeffries and Smith’s homes in the Hamptons on Long Island, or to hotels around the world, including in England, France, Italy and Morocco.
Mr Peace said Jeffries and Smith, both from Florida, and Jacobson, of Wisconsin, “used force, fraud and coercion to traffic those men for their own sexual gratification”, with the indictment identifying 15 alleged victims.
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He added that many of the victims, at least one of whom was as young as 19, were financially vulnerable and aspired to become models in the fashion industry.
Lawyers for Jeffries and Smith have previously “vehemently denied” any wrongdoing.
Mr Peace said the alleged sex trafficking and prostitution enterprise “lasted at least from the end of 2008 until early 2015”.
The US Attorney Office for the Eastern District of New York said on Tuesday that Jeffries had been released on a 10 million dollar bond, Jacobson was released on a 500,000 dollar (£385,000) bond, and Smith was “ordered detained”.
Mr Peace previously said prosecutors were seeking detention for Smith because the risk of flight was “particularly acute” as he is a dual citizen of the US and the UK.