With investors and analysts gathered in Columbus, Ohio, on Tuesday for a day of presentations and store tours by the company that owns Victoria’s Secret and Bath & Body Works, Leslie H. Wexner, its chief executive and founder, spoke publicly for the first time about his longtime ties to Jeffrey Epstein.

“More than a decade ago, I severed relationships with a personal financial adviser,” Mr. Wexner, 82, the leader of L Brands, said without naming Mr. Epstein. He condemned Mr. Epstein’s behavior and deceptions by “people who have secret lives.”

Mr. Epstein was arrested in July and charged with sex trafficking involving girls as young as 14. Through written statements, Mr. Wexner has sought to distance himself from the financier, whom he employed for more than a decade. He has also said that Mr. Epstein “misappropriated vast sums of money” from him and his family. Mr. Epstein died last month in prison in what the authorities said was an apparent suicide.

“At some point in your life, we are all betrayed by friends, and if we haven’t, we’re really fortunate to have lived a perfectly sheltered life,” Mr. Wexner said at the presentation. “Being taken advantage of by someone who was so sick, so cunning, so depraved is something that I’m embarrassed that I was even close to, but that is in the past.”