By Hazel Gandhi
A viral photo purporting to show former United States President Donald Trump and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein photographed together on a private jet decades go is viral online.
BOOM found that even though Trump and Epstein have been photographed together on several occasions, this particular image is fake and has been made using generative-AI.
A US court recently ruled in favour of releasing sealed documents that shed further light on the names of Epstein's network of acquaintances and business associates. Epstein was first arrested in 2005 after he was accused of paying a 14-year-old girl in exchange for sex. He was then charged with sex trafficking in 2019 and died by suicide in jail while awaiting trial. Some famous names known to be associated with Epstein include Donald Trump, former US President Bill Clinton, and Prince Andrew; the latter settled a lawsuit with Virginia Giuffre, one of Epstein's victims, in 2022.
The newly released documents are expected to carry the names of several people involved in the lawsuit; not all of them are accused of wrongdoing. Names of victims, accusers, witnesses of the crimes, and Epstein's employees are also expected to be included.
The image of Trump and Epstein posing together in a private jet is being shared with the caption, "Trump and Epstein in the Lolita express, #EpsteinClientList ⤵️".
Click here to view the post and here for an archive.
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FACT CHECK
BOOM found that the image has been created using generative-AI and is not real.
We first ran a reverse image search of the photo on Google and did not find any news articles or verified social media handles carry it.
We then uploaded the image on AI-image detection tools Hive Detector and Is It AI?, which estimated that the photo was highly likely to be generated using AI.
However, Trump and Epstein have been photographed on numerous occasions in the past, see here and here, including this famous photo of them with their respective partners Melania Trump (then Knauss) and Ghislaine Maxwell. Maxwell, who was accused of procuring Epstein's underage victims, is currently serving a 20-year sentence.
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