New York, New York - Pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein was ready to reward one of his victim's friends if they could "prove her allegations false" – including that Professor Stephen Hawking participated in an underage orgy, court documents have revealed.

The names of more than 170 people who were either associates, friends, or victims of Epstein were made public following a US judge's order last month.

The first tranche of documents was released on Wednesday evening, with high-profile figures such as Britain's Prince Andrew and former US President Bill Clinton featuring heavily, as previously expected.

An email from Epstein to disgraced British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell showed he was content for her to "issue a reward" to any of Virginia Giuffre's friends to counter her claims, shortly after she filed a civil claim in the US in 2015.

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The email read: "You can issue a reward to any of Virginia's friends, acquaints, family that come forward and help prove her allegations are false."

"The strongest is the Clinton dinner, and the new version in the Virgin Islands that Stephen Hawking participated in an underage orgy."

Also published among the court documents as part of Giuffre's civil claim against Maxwell was the transcript of the socialite's videotaped evidence given under oath.

In one document, a woman named Johanna Sjoberg claimed Prince Andrew touched her breast while sitting on a couch inside the billionaire's Manhattan apartment in 2001, while giving testimony in May 2016.

Buckingham Palace previously said the allegations are "categorically untrue."

The documents are part of a 2015 defamation case by Virginia Giuffre against Ghislaine Maxwell, the disgraced British socialite who supplied Epstein with underage girls.

In Sjoberg's interview under oath, which is called a deposition in the US, she also said Epstein had told her former President Bill Clinton "likes them young, referring to girls."