Howard Rubin was arrested today at his Connecticut home and indicted on a 10-count federal criminal complaint in Brooklyn, New York, alongside his former personal assistant, Jennifer Powers, 45, of Southlake, Texas. The charges include sex trafficking by force, fraud, or coercion; transportation of individuals for prostitution; and bank fraud. Rubin worked as a portfolio manager at Soros Fund Management from 2008 to 2015, handling a specialized mortgage-backed securities fund during the post-financial crisis recovery period.
How long will it take for the media to characterize these actions as evidence that President Trump is using the federal government to go after his political enemies?
Rubin, also known as “Howie” or “H,” is a 70-year-old retired Wall Street financier and former bond trader. He gained prominence in the 1980s as a trader at Salomon Brothers, where he was featured in Michael Lewis’s book Liar’s Poker for his high-stakes, aggressive style in mortgage-backed securities trading. Later, he served as a senior managing director at Bear Stearns from 1987 to 1999, overseeing the collateralized mortgage obligations desk. In 2008, Rubin came out of retirement to manage a mortgage-backed securities fund for Soros Fund Management LLC, the investment firm founded by billionaire George Soros. He left the firm in 2015 and has since been retired, residing in Fairfield, Connecticut.
Prosecutors allege that from at least 2009 to 2019, Rubin and Powers operated a national trafficking network, spending over $1 million of Rubin’s funds to recruit and coerce dozens of women—often targeting former Playboy models or those in financial distress—into commercial sex acts involving bondage, discipline, dominance, submission, and sadomasochism (BDSM).
These encounters allegedly occurred in luxury New York hotels and, later, a soundproofed two-bedroom penthouse apartment on Central Park South that Rubin rented and converted into what he reportedly called a “sex dungeon,” equipped with BDSM apparatus, restraints, and gags. According to the indictment, Rubin ignored women’s safe words, bound and gagged them to prevent verbal stops, and inflicted physical and psychological harm, sometimes requiring medical attention. Powers is accused of recruiting the women, arranging interstate travel (often under false pretenses like modeling gigs), paying them (typically $2,000–$5,000 per session), and managing complaints or “fallout.” If convicted, Rubin faces a mandatory minimum of 15 years in prison per trafficking count and up to life imprisonment overall.
Rubin has faced prior civil allegations related to these claims. In 2017, three women sued him for $27 million, accusing him of rape, assault, and trafficking in the same penthouse setup; additional lawsuits followed from other victims. In 2021, six women expanded the claims, alleging BDSM abuse beyond consent. Rubin denied the accusations, but the women secured a multimillion-dollar civil judgment against him for violating the Trafficking Victims Protection Act.
The criminal case follows a nearly eight-year lag since the initial civil suit, with no official explanation from prosecutors, which will no doubt be cited as evidence of a Trump vendetta.
