A french modelling agent who was close to the US financier Jeffrey Epstein and by extension Prince Andrew was found dead on Saturday in his Paris prison cell.

The 75-year-old was being held in custody pending an investigation into several allegations including; rape and trafficking of minors for sexual exploitation.

Although it was not confirmed by prosecutors, a source close to the investigation speaking on the condition of anonymity told the AFP news agency that Jean-Luc Brunel had been found hanged.

Brunel was detained at Paris's Charles de Gaulle Airport in 2020 as part of a broad French probe unleashed by sex-trafficking charges in the US against Epstein.

Having been a frequent companion of Epstein, he was considered central to the French investigation into the alleged sexual exploitation of women and girls by the US financier and his circle.

In December, he was charged with the rape of minor girls. His death comes just two years after Epstein himself died by suicide in a Manhattan jail.

"His tragedy is that of a 75-year-old man crushed by a media-judicial system, about which there will now be time to ask questions," his lawyers, Mathias Chichportich, Marianne Abgrall and Christophe Ingrain said in a statement.

"Jean-Luc Brunel had always maintained his innocence and had intensified his efforts to prove it," it said, adding that his apparent suicide death was "not guided by guilt but a profound sense of injustice".

Multiple women have come forward to accuse Brunel since the French probe was opened in 2019.

Earlier this week, Prince Andrew agreed to settle a case in which he was accused of sexually abusing 17-year-old Virginia Giuffre trafficked to him by Epstein.

The deal, in which Andrew agreed to make a substantial donation to his accuser's charity, avoids a trial.