Ghislaine Maxwell Alleges Former FAS Dean Henry Rosovsky Received ‘Massage’ at Epstein’s House

Convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell alleged that former Faculty of Arts and Sciences Dean Henry A. Rosovsky received a “massage” through disgraced billionaire and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s network, according to a transcript of a United States Department of Justice interview released on Aug. 22.

In the two-day interview with Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche in July, Maxwell said Rosovsky — an economist who twice served as Harvard’s acting president and died in 2022 — was among Epstein’s circle in the early 1990s and recounted seeing him at Epstein’s townhouse in New York.

“I saw him in a bathrobe at 71st Street, and he had received a massage, he told me,” Maxwell said.

Asked whether the masseuse was naked, Maxwell replied that she “wouldn’t have any idea.” She speculated that it was unlikely because of Rosovsky’s older age.

Federal prosecutors have said Epstein and Maxwell used the word “massage” as code for sexual encounters with the girls and young women they recruited. Epstein pled guilty in 2008 to Florida state charges of soliciting prostitution and soliciting prostitution with a minor, but died in prison in 2019 before he could be convicted on federal charges related to sex trafficking of minors.

Maxwell — a co-conspirator in Epstein’s sex ring — sat for the interview while serving a 20-year federal sentence for child sex trafficking. The DOJ held the interview as U.S. President Donald Trump came under fire for his association with Epstein and faced growing pressure over his administration’s handling of the Epstein case.

Maxwell’s credibility, however, remains in question. Federal prosecutors have accused her of lying under oath and she has faced perjury charges, with prosecutors saying she repeatedly misled courts to protect herself and Epstein.

Maxwell, who is seeking a presidential pardon, told Blanche she never saw Trump engage in wrongdoing with Epstein’s girls. Days after the interview, she was transferred to the Federal Prison Camp in Bryan, Texas, a minimum-security facility that houses only women, most of them serving time for nonviolent offenses and white-collar crimes.

The episode has been particularly fraught for Trump. On the campaign trail, he pledged to release Epstein-related files, but later backtracked, declaring the so-called “client list” a fiction created by “Obama, Crooked Hillary, Comey, Brennan, and the Losers and Criminals of the Biden Administration.”

Maxwell’s mention of Rosovsky adds a new twist to Harvard’s long and tangled relationship with Epstein, who has donated millions of dollars anonymously to the University.

In 1991, Epstein helped facilitate a $2 million donation from billionaire Leslie H. Wexner to fund the construction of Harvard Hillel’s Rosovsky Hall, named in the former dean’s honor, though Epstein did not contribute his own money. Rosovsky also frequented Epstein’s Cambridge office during his tenure at the helm of the FAS.

Epstein hosted seminars on evolutionary biology on Harvard’s campus, which Rosovosky attended “a couple” of times before, he said, he “lost interest.”

Other Harvard figures have also been drawn into Epstein’s orbit. Harvard Law School professor Alan M. Dershowitz, who represented Epstein during his 2008 sex-crimes scene, has acknowledged socializing with him but denied any misconduct.

In the interview, Maxwell said she believed Epstein and Dershowitz first met on Martha’s Vineyard through Lynn Forester de Rothschild. She recalled two encounters with Dershowitz in Epstein’s company — once with him and his wife on Epstein’s private island and another time at what she remembered as his Boston home.

“I actually remember that,” Maxwell said of seeing Dershowitz on the island. “And I remember, I think, going to his house in Boston.”

Asked directly whether she ever saw Dershowitz receive a massage or engage in misconduct, Maxwell said no.

“I don’t believe I ever even saw him in a bathrobe,” she said.

Dershowitz has previously acknowledged “very possibly” sending Epstein a birthday card in 2003, but denied knowing of Epstein’s crimes at the time and said he never “renewed a personal relationship with him” after representing him.

Blanche directly pressed Maxwell on her knowledge of Epstein’s relationship with figures at Harvard and at MIT. She said he was friendly with Harvard faculty including Biology and Mathematics professor Martin A. Nowak — who was temporarily sanctioned by the FAS for his extensive ties to Epstein — and the eminent evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould. Both men may have attended dinners at Epstein’s house, Maxwell claimed.

Asked why Epstein cultivated ties to Harvard and MIT, she said “he really was profoundly interested in that area of science and in the brain.”

Several other prominent figures at the University have previously been implicated in Epstein’s network. Former University President Lawrence H. Summers had ties to Epstein in the early 2000s, including meetings in Boston after Epstein’s 2008 guilty plea.

Asked about Summers, Maxwell claimed that he and Epstein were “friendly” but said she did not recall seeing Summers travel on Epstein’s plane.

Trump has repeatedly invoked Summers as of late when pressed about his own ties to Epstein, calling the former Harvard president “best friends with Jeffrey Epstein” last month in the Oval Office.

Summers did not respond to a request for comment.

Harvard’s ties to Epstein extended beyond individuals. His largest single donation to the University — $6.5 million in 2003 — created the Program for Evolutionary Dynamics, run by Nowak, which was later shut down in 2021 after a University review revealed Epstein had been granted regular access to its offices.

Maxwell said in the interview that Epstein’s ties to Harvard may have been facilitated by his client Leslie H. Wexner, the billionaire Harvard donor and former CEO of L Brands.

—Staff writer Dhruv T. Patel can be reached at dhruv.patel@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @dhruvtkpatel.

—Staff writer Saketh Sundar can be reached at saketh.sundar@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @saketh_sundar.