John Pierpont Morgan, America’s most celebrated banker, so hated publicity he’d attack photographers with his umbrella in the street.
So quite what that venerable Edwardian financier would make of the scandal now engulfing the banking giant that carries his name doesn’t bear thinking about.
JPMorgan Chase (JPMC), America’s biggest bank with a history stretching back more than 200 years, has been rocked by a bombshell lawsuit that accuses one female executive of making a male employee her office ‘sex slave’ at its New York headquarters.
Lorna Hajdini, 37, an executive director in JPMC’s Leveraged Finance division, is accused in the filing of coercing a banker junior to her into ‘non-consensual and humiliating sex acts’ over several months, despite his pleas for her to stop.
Her accuser claims she admitted to repeatedly drugging him with the date rape drug Rohypnol as well as Viagra and, during one encounter, rebuked him when he cried as she performed a sex act on him against his will.
He said in the court filings that Ms Hajdini, whom he claims also rained racist abuse down on him, threatened to ruin his career when he refused her advances – which included once turning up at his apartment and demanding sex.
The plaintiff filed the lawsuit anonymously on the grounds that he and his family had received threats. However, he has now been identified by numerous bank sources (and the New York Post) as 35-year-old Chirayu Rana who, until last month, was working for a private equity firm in New York.
Rana’s lawsuit reads like a film script – 46 pages filled with lurid descriptions of sex acts he says he was subjected to, lewd dialogue and profane language.
Lorna Hajdini, an executive director in JPMorgan Chase’s leveraged finance division, is accused of coercing a banker junior to her into ‘non-consensual and humiliating sex acts’
It has more than a whiff of the steamy BBC/HBO series Industry – set in a modern London investment bank – where highly charged sexual trysts are as much a part of the job description as sealing multi-billion-pound deals.
And in part this may explain why the JPMorgan saga – glamorous and wealthy high-flying executives allegedly indulging in low behaviour – has so captured public imagination on social media, going viral with astonishing speed.
Rana has been diagnosed with PTSD, according to his lawyer, Daniel Kaiser. He is seeking damages for lost earnings, emotional distress and reputational harm, as well as punitive damages and changes to the bank’s practices.
The lawsuit was initially filed last Monday in New York State Supreme Court, and the Daily Mail broke the story on Wednesday. Since then its original report has been viewed more than 60million times on X.
In a statement issued through her lawyers, Ms Hajdini has vehemently denied any wrongdoing.
‘She never engaged in any inappropriate conduct with this individual of any kind and has never even been to the location where the alleged sexual assault supposedly took place,’ said her lawyer.
The lawsuit also accuses JPMC of enabling the alleged abuse and retaliating against the banker after he reported it.
Rana claims in his complaint that the bank placed him on involuntary leave, destroyed his reputation and allowed threats against him to continue while Ms Hajdini and others went unpunished. JPMC strongly denies all the claims against it.
Rana made an internal complaint in May 2025, alleging he’d been a victim of race and gender-based harassment and abuse of power, and that he later tried to negotiate a payoff that ran into ‘millions’ to leave the firm.
In the days following the revelations, scepticism has been growing about Rana’s claims, particularly after his lawsuit was returned late last Wednesday.
According to his lawyers, this was on the orders of the court clerk because of a procedural issue in the way it had been submitted. However, it gave rise to suspicions that Rana may have decided to back down after the media firestorm. That proved not to be the case when he refiled.
Chirayu Rana has accused Ms Hajdini of rebuking him when he cried as she performed a sex act on him against his will
It’s also been claimed by apparent bank insiders that Ms Hajdini wasn’t ever Rana’s boss as alleged in the complaint – although she was senior to him in the company hierarchy – but they were simply colleagues on the same team.
This contradicts one of the original lawsuit’s specific claims that she threatened to block his promotion and annual bonus if he refused to comply with her sexual demands.
A bank spokesman told the Daily Mail that an internal investigation had found no evidence to support Rana’s allegations in the lawsuit, saying: ‘We don’t believe there’s any merit to these claims.’
‘While numerous employees co-operated with the investigation, the complainant refused to participate and has declined to provide facts that would be central to supporting his allegations.’
Several colleagues have rushed to Ms Hajdini’s defence.
‘He has tarnished her with a complete fabrication,’ said one.
Others say the reason the lawsuit reads like a work of fiction – some have described it as a Fifty Shades of Grey-style fantasy – is because it is exactly that.
However, the alleged victim is sticking to his guns. Rana’s lawyer insists his client was a victim of ‘horrific sexual abuse’ and therefore reserved the right to file his allegations anonymously.
‘As to Ms Hajdini’s predictable denials, I look forward to discovery and, in particular, her deposition,’ said Kaiser. ‘The abuse occurred and we will prove it.’
He told the Daily Mail that the lawsuit was removed from court records last Thursday because it hadn’t been submitted with the proper papers and was returned to his office to be amended.
On Monday, it was refiled along with two sworn witness statements. The names of the witnesses, along with Rana’s, have been redacted – for their own protection, says Rana – although they have been revealed to the parties in the case.
One alleged witness said in their statement that they were staying at an apartment with Rana in September 2024 when they were woken in the night by a woman who was ‘clearly intoxicated and speaking loudly’. Rana later identified the woman as Ms Hajdini, according to the statement.
Mr Rana, pictured with his parents, filed the lawsuit anonymously on the grounds that he and his family had received threats, but has now been identified by numerous bank sources (and the New York Post)
‘A short while later, I was awoken by Ms Hajdini, who was completely naked,’ the witness wrote. ‘Ms Hajdini sat on the couch and lit a cigarette. She then asked me to come to the bedroom with her and “join them”. I told her no. She said, “Come join, come join”. I again told her no.’
The witness said Ms Hajdini then told them, ‘You know, I own [Rana], so you’d better come join.’
They again refused, and Ms Hajdini returned to the bedroom and closed the door, according to the filing.
From inside, the witness said they heard arguing, with Rana ‘loudly pleading’ with Ms Hajdini ‘to stop, and to leave’.
‘It became quiet. Then, sometime later, [Ms Hajdini] came out of the bedroom and left the apartment,’ the witness said in the filing.
The second alleged witness said Rana had told him in mid-2024 that a woman in the office was ‘making his life hell’ and that he later saw Ms Hajdini kissing Rana’s neck and grabbing him and that he appeared uncomfortable.
Additional new exhibits include an affidavit in which Rana says he was diagnosed with PTSD in October 2025 which he attributes to the alleged assaults plus a letter from his counsellor confirming he had been treated for PTSD.
JPMC declined to comment on the latest filings and Ms Hajdini’s attorneys have not responded to the Daily Mail’s approach.
Ms Hajdini, who is of Albanian heritage and comes from the New York suburb of White Plains, an affluent town in Westchester County, graduated from the prestigious Stern School of Business in New York and later attended the Private Equity and Venture Capital programme at Harvard Business School.
The banker, who is unmarried and doesn’t appear to have children, now lives in a high-rise apartment building in Midtown Manhattan. She is a wine buff who volunteers for the charity Minds Matter, which helps underprivileged teenagers go to university.
Rana, a high-school soccer star, grew up in the wealthy Washington DC suburb of Vienna, Virginia. He was educated at Rutgers University in New Jersey where he played basketball. He owns a flat in Kips Bay, a neighbourhood in Midtown Manhattan, and was married at some point although it is unclear if he remains so.
JPMorgan Chase in New York strongly denies all the claims against it. Rana alleged a culture within his team that was driven by racism and antipathy towards Asians
Kaiser, his lawyer, told the Daily Mail he was not authorised to discuss his client’s personal life, revealing only that he has been personally and professionally ‘destroyed’ by the alleged abuse he claims to have suffered during his time at JPMC.
Before joining the bank in 2024, Rana spent brief stints at several of Wall Street’s most prestigious finance houses, including Houlihan Lokey, Credit Suisse, Morgan Stanley and The Carlyle Group, rarely staying for longer than two years.
After leaving JPMC in late 2025, he joined Bregal Sagemount, a firm that manages billions in capital, but left in April – three weeks before filing the lawsuit against Ms Hajdini.
The reasons for his exit were not immediately clear. A Sagemount spokesman said that Rana joined in October last year but was ‘no longer an employee’ as of April 2.
His current whereabouts and employment status are not known. The Daily Mail visited his family’s $1.75million (£1.29million) home in Virginia last Friday. A member of his family answered the door and said Rana doesn’t live there and rarely comes back to visit.
Former colleagues of Rana’s at JPMorgan told the Daily Mail they were shocked by the allegations he made against Ms Hajdini, who is reportedly highly thought of within the bank.
One member of staff likened Rana’s allegations to ‘fan fiction’ and for their part believes they were fabricated following a breakdown of workplace relations.
Two other sources questioned the lawsuit’s accusations and expressed sympathy for Ms Hajdini on account of the public scrutiny she’s been facing and the potential damage to her reputation.
Rana’s tenure at JPMorgan appeared to come to a head in the late spring-early summer of 2025.
Last May, he filed an internal complaint of discrimination and harassment, accusing Ms Hajdini of race and gender-based discrimination, alleging a pattern of severe sexual abuse, as stated in his lawsuit.
Rana, who describes himself as of Asian descent, detailed a culture within his team at JPMorgan that was driven by racism and antipathy towards Asians, according to his complaint.
He claims that, in June last year, he was reprimanded by a superior for issuing feedback to a more junior female staff member (not Ms Hajdini) regarding her ‘failure to meet an important deadline and expressed his expectation for equitable treatment regardless of his ethnicity’, according to his lawsuit.
He was placed on involuntary administrative leave the following day, before departing the company more than three months later, according to his complaint.
Sources have questioned the lawsuit’s accusations and expressed sympathy for Ms Hajdini on account of the public scrutiny she’s been facing and the potential damage to her reputation
Kaiser told the Daily Mail that his client spent months negotiating an out-of-court settlement with the bank but the latter ‘repeatedly postponed and prolonged settlement and mediation discussions’ to settle his abuse and discrimination claims.
His decision to file the suit against Ms Hajdini and JMPC came after a ‘great deal of emotional and personal perseverance’, his lawyer said. A spokesman for JPMC, meanwhile, said a thorough internal investigation uncovered no evidence of harassment or abuse by Ms Hajdini nor any other employee named in his initial complaint.
A post on the legal advice website Ask A Lawyer dated ten months ago has since emerged online, apparently showing someone by the name of Chirayu Rana seeking advice from an AI chatbot on filing a lawsuit against a superior at Morgan Stanley.
The post appears to detail many similar allegations made by Rana against Ms Hajdini and JPMC.
The author of the post states that after coming forward with the allegations, they were ‘retaliated against for seeking to move groups internally at the firm’.
They continue: ‘HR conducted an “investigation” but they ultimately made me sign a Separation Agreement,’ adding that they signed the agreement under ‘duress’.
It’s unclear whether the Chirayu Rana listed is the same Chirayu Rana who has accused Ms Hajdini of abuse. His lawyer has not returned a request for comment on the matter.
According to the lawsuit, Ms Hajdini’s alleged abuse started almost immediately after the pair began working together in the spring of 2024.
Rana joined as a Senior Vice President/Director that March, and claims Ms Hajdini was appointed to the team in a senior role – acting as his ‘supervisor’ – the following month, the lawsuit alleges.
The harassment, according to Rana’s complaint, started in May 2024 with Ms Hajdini once dropping her pen on the floor next to his desk and, while bending to pick it up, rubbing his leg and squeezing his calf.
He claims she then remarked, ‘Oh, you did play basketball in college? … I love basketball players.’ She then allegedly uttered an obscene remark about the effect basketball players had on her.
The alleged sexual advances became more explicit and frequent, it is claimed, while she continued to threaten to ruin his career if he didn’t comply. On occasions he attempted to comply but couldn’t physically do so, evoking more insults from his abuser, he alleges in his complaint.
Later that May, Rana claims Ms Hajdini invited him out for drinks, but he declined. In response, she is alleged to have said: ‘If you don’t f*** me soon, I’m going to ruin you… never forget, I f****** own you.’
Twice, he says, Ms Hajdini propositioned him for oral sex in the office, on one occasion asking: ‘Birthday BJ for the brown boy? My little brown boy.’
If he continued to spurn her advances, she allegedly told him, she would ensure he was never promoted to executive director, according to his lawsuit.
‘You’re gonna need to earn it, my little Arab boy toy,’ she allegedly told him during a bank staff social event at which she is accused of groping him under a table.
The lawsuit has certainly left many observers with questions about its credibility. For a start, although it contains a vast number of direct quotes, none of them are contained within any text messages and emails that are often presented in such cases as evidence of what is alleged. The evidence instead appears based on the plaintiff’s memory.
Then there’s the language, both the sex talk and the racial slurs, which is so obscene and pornographic that – as some have speculated online – it reads more like the creation of an AI chatbot than a 37-year-old female banker. Or perhaps, some online critics believe, like a man who’s watched too many adult films.
Would a high-ranking finance executive working for one of the world’s most prestigious banks say, for instance, something like: ‘I bet your little Asian, fish head, wife doesn’t have these cannons,’ as she revealed her breasts?
The lawsuit insists she did – and many far more sordid remarks, often about oral sex – but many online commenters clearly find that claim surprising.
Rana also claims in his lawsuit that he was subjected to offensive racial abuse by white men on his team and suffered racial discrimination at the bank.
He is also suing his former employer for defaming him by disparaging him to other finance companies who were considering offering him a job, telling them he was ‘lazy’, ‘incompetent’, and an ‘introvert’ as well as unfaithful to his ‘domestic partner’ and a heavy drinker. He said the bank said he had been ‘fired’ which was again incorrect, he says in his lawsuit.
Perhaps Rana has, as he lays out in such great detail, been the victim of a terrible injustice at the hands of a ruthless and predatory boss. This will be for the court to decide.
But some question whether there is an alternative explanation rooted in another terrible injustice: the system of ‘litigation privilege’ that allows claimants to make nearly whatever claims they like in a lawsuit and be legally protected from being counter-sued for defamation and other claims for statements in the filings.
Megan Thomas, a US-based sexual harassment lawyer, told the Daily Mail: ‘When a lawsuit is filed publicly, it becomes part of the public record. That means even if allegations are ultimately unfounded, the claims themselves can remain accessible.’
She went on: ‘For individuals named in a lawsuit, the permanent public record can have lasting and dire consequences for their reputation and future employment.’
A JPMorgan insider told the Daily Mail this week: ‘Everyone I know believes there’s no way this is true… I just hope [Ms Hajdini] is able to bounce back from this and her life and career aren’t impacted any more than they have been.’
