Disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein continued to sexually abuse and traffic young women and girls to his private island as recently as 2018, with potentially hundreds of previously unknown victims, a new lawsuit alleges.

The lawsuit, filed by the attorney general of the US Virgin Islands, cites new evidence that Epstein used a computerized database to track women and girls – some as young as 11 – to Little Saint James island, a private estate Epstein purchased in 2016. According to the lawsuit, one girl attempted an escape by swimming, but was later found and had her passport confiscated.

According to Wednesday’s complaint, Epstein and his alleged accomplices “trafficked, raped, sexually assaulted and held captive underage girls and young women” at his Virgin Islands properties.

In July last year, Epstein faced federal sex trafficking and conspiracy charges for allegedly exploiting dozens of women and girls in New York and Florida between 2002 and 2005. He had previously pleaded guilty in 2008 to a Florida state prostitution charge and completed a 13-month jail sentence.

Epstein pleaded not guilty to the fresh charges. He died by suicide in a New York jail cell in August.

According to Denise N George, attorney general for the US Virgin Islands, the suit aims to recoup damages from Epstein’s estate, estimated to be worth $577.7m. This suit marks the first against Epstein’s estate by the American territory or any government entity. George enlisted her office’s independent investigators and court documents from other cases to allege that Little Saint James was the epicenter of a decades-long sex trafficking scheme.

“Epstein clearly used the Virgin Islands and his residence in the US Virgin Islands at Little Saint James as a way to be able to conceal and to be able to expand his activity here,” George told the New York Times.

According to court documents, investigators from the territory’s justice department were barred from entering Little Saint James during a routine visit in July 2018. Epstein, a registered sex offender, claimed the island’s dock as his “front door” to block the visit.

The island’s government aims to seize Little Saint James and its sister island, Great Saint James, also owned by Epstein. They also aim to shut down the dozens of shell companies Epstein created in the territory that, prosecutors say, masked his elaborate sex-trafficking scheme. George told the New York Times that the damages could be distributed to his victims.

Reuters contributed to this report