Hugh Hefner ‘repeatedly warned FBI about Epstein’ after Playboy Playmate ‘was raped and trafficked by paedo financier’

PLAYBOY founder Hugh Hefner repeatedly warned the FBI about Jeffrey Epstein after a model told him she was allegedly raped and trafficked by the paedophile financier, reports say. Audra Lynn Christiansen made the claims to the late magazine publisher when she was 23 prompting him to alert authorities, according to a lawsuit. Audra Lynn (R) reportedly told Hugh Hefner (C) to alert the FBI about her allegations Credit: Getty The former model said she was allegedly raped and trafficked by Jeffrey Epstein Credit: AFP The Playboy Playmate, who was Miss October 2003, reportedly told Hefner she was trafficked to a Macau casino billionaire named Stanley Ho, the filing says. Ho, dubbed China’s “Godfather of gambling”, died in 2020. Sign up for The Sun newsletter Thank you! Christiansen, now 46, asked Hefner to call the FBI on her behalf in 2005 as she believed the businessman had “clout” and connections in the agency. Hefner reportedly called the FBI “multiple times”. Audra Lynn (R) was Miss October 2003 and told Hefner about the allegations when she was 23 Credit: Getty Hugh Hefner told the FBI about the claims, according to a lawsuit Credit: Getty The complaint reads: “Mr. Hefner called the FBI multiple times on behalf of Ms. Christiansen to report Jeffrey Epstein.” The revelations are part of an amended complaint filed in May in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida. In the lawsuit, victims of Epstein claim FBI failed to act on multiple reports about his sexual abuse as early as 1996. Jordan Merson, lawyer for the victims, told The New York Post: “The fact that the FBI is trying to utilize procedural technicalities to try to avert accountability and responsibility for its failures to properly investigate Jeffrey Epstein for over 20 years should be deeply concerning to all. Most read in The Sun The paedophile financier died in 2019 while awaiting trial Credit: Getty Hugh Hefner died in 2017 Credit: Getty “How can you learn from errors if you do not acknowledge them?” Christiansen, who once featured on the reality television series “The Girls Next Door”, was only contacted by the FBI in October 2020 following Epstein’s death. The agency got in touch to follow up on the information provided 15 years ago, according to the lawsuit. In her initial report, she claimed her agents introduced her to Epstein, who wanted to meet her after the release of a Playboy shoot where she featured. Hefner himself was accused of rape five years after his 2017 death in the “Secrets of Playboy” documentary. Several women in the film alleged he was a “predator” who was into bestiality. The claims never made it to court and Hefner was never accused of rape while he was alive. In the Epstein files released earlier this year by the Department of Justice, Ho is referred to as “the richest man in Hong Kong” in a 2011 email written by Epstein. The disgraced financier tells a friend in the message Ho “owns most of Macau” and calls him “the leader of the Chinese mob”. The FBI tried to get the lawsuit thrown out in June, saying it was “not required to investigate every complaint” it received. The case is still ongoing in court. Epstein died in 2019 in a New York jail cell while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges. Comment now