House Oversight report urges DOJ to investigate former Mayor Philip Levine; he denies allegation

The U.S. House Oversight Committee says the Justice Department should further investigate a sexual assault allegation against former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine, in a report released Tuesday on the federal government’s handling of the Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell cases. Levine denies the allegation.

The allegation comes from Sarah Kellen, who worked as an assistant to Epstein for years and whom the committee describes as an Epstein survivor. In a transcribed interview with the committee on May 21, she said Levine forced himself on her during a summer stay at a house Epstein and Maxwell had rented in Saint-Tropez, in her first or second year working for them, according to an excerpt printed in the report. Kellen told the committee that no one witnessed it and that she told no one at the time, Miami New Times reported. Red Sidewalks has not independently verified the allegation.

The report says the committee referred Levine and celebrity hairstylist Frédéric Fekkai, whom Kellen also accused, to the Justice Department for further investigation. The committee’s release identifies Levine as mayor of Miami Beach from 2013 to 2017; the body of the report calls him a former mayor of Miami.

The report also says evidence suggests Epstein used princess code names for women and that Levine and banker Jes Staley were complicit in or knew of that practice. It cites a 2002 email from Levine to Maxwell, released in the Justice Department’s Epstein files.

“Mr. Levine categorically denies Ms. Kellen’s allegation,” a Levine spokesman told Miami New Times on Wednesday. The spokesman said the two had a consensual relationship as adults more than 25 years ago, called the code-name claim false and said Levine never used such a code or knew of any such scheme. He pointed to a Justice Department statement, reported by Business Insider, that prosecutors had interviewed Kellen and found no prosecutable case, and would look again if the committee sent a criminal referral with new evidence, New Times reported.

Levine’s name appears more than 600 times in the Epstein files the Justice Department released Jan. 30, New Times has reported. The report was written by the committee’s majority staff, under Chairman James Comer.