Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell in a photo filed as an exhibit in Maxwell’s criminal trial.
US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York
Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyers are arguing for her release in a federal appeals court.The appeal focuses on a non-prosecution agreement between Jeffrey Epstein and federal prosecutors.If the appeal is successful, Maxwell could potentially be freed and face another trial.
Lawyers for Ghislaine Maxwell — the former Jeffrey Epstein associate convicted of trafficking girls to him for sex — are set to appear before a panel of three judges in a federal appeals court Tuesday afternoon and argue that she should be set free from prison.
A jury in Manhattan federal court found Maxwell guilty on sex-trafficking charges in December 2021, four days after her 60th birthday that Christmas. They agreed with the prosecutors’ allegations that she groomed four girls for Epstein to rape and, in some cases, sexually abused them herself.
Alison Nathan, the judge who oversaw Maxwell’s trial, sentenced her to 20 years in prison and issued a $750,000 fine. In her sentencing remarks, Nathan said Maxwell weaponized her status as a sophisticated adult woman to deceive the girls into trusting her.
“She befriended and developed relationships of trust,” Nathan said at the hearing. “She then manipulated the victims and normalized sexual abuse through her involvement, encouragement, and instruction.”
Maxwell has maintained her innocence. Her attorneys have argued that she was scapegoated by federal prosecutors after Epstein — a fantastically wealthy and well-connected financier who may have sexually abused up to 200 people — slipped through their fingers by killing himself in jail while awaiting trial on his own set of sex-trafficking charges in 2019. At her sentencing hearing, Maxwell claimed she was “fooled” by Epstein and hoped her “harsh and unusual incarceration” brought his victims some relief.
“Despite the many helpful and positive things I have done in my life, and will continue to do, to assist others during my sentence, I know that my association with Epstein and this case will forever and permanently stain me,” she said. “It is the greatest regret of my life that I ever met Jeffrey Epstein.”
Maxwell, who is serving her sentence in a low security federal prison in Tallahassee, Florida, isn’t expected to appear at the hearing herself.
If the judges agree with her lawyers’ arguments, Maxwell could potentially be set free and — depending on the ruling — face another trial.
It could force the women who already testified about Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse to face the prospect of testifying again, repeating their experiences to a jury they would hope believes them.
Epstein’s non-prosecution agreement and a rogue juror complicate the case
The appeal has moved slowly to a hearing. Maxwell retained the firm Aidala Bertuna & Kamins, well known in New York’s legal scene for taking on challenging cases, including the appeal for Harvey Weinstein’s criminal conviction in Manhattan and defending Rudy Giuliani from disbarment. Her 113-page appeal brief was authored partly by John M. Leventhal, a former New York state appeals court judge.
Diana Fabi Samson, the brief’s lead author, will present arguments before the judges on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday. Maurene Comey, one of the prosecutors in the trial, is expected to present arguments on behalf of the Justice Department, according to the court docket.
In the appeal filing, Maxwell’s legal team said the case was marred by missteps. Their argument is based on three main points: That the victims’ claims were outside the statute of limitations (much of the abuse the victims testified about occurred in the 1990s and 2000s), that Maxwell was shielded by a non-prosecution agreement between Epstein and the US Department of Justice, and that a rogue juror spoiled the trial by failing to disclose his own history as a victim of sexual abuse.
The juror in question — identified as Juror 50 in court documents and Scott David, his first and middle name, in interviews — told members of the media after Maxwell’s conviction that he was himself sexually abused as a child.
Nathan, the judge who oversaw Maxwell’s case, summoned the juror to the witness stand in a highly unusual hearing to determine why he omitted the event from his juror questionnaire. He said he was bored during the selection process and “flew through” the form. The judge ultimately ruled that the verdict would stand, finding he didn’t deliberately lie and wouldn’t have been invalidated as a juror.
The 2007 non-prosecution agreement stems from an earlier criminal case against Epstein, in Florida. Law enforcement officials had concluded he sexually abused dozens of girls at the time but, with the help of his high-powered lawyers, Epstein pleaded guilty only to soliciting sex from one underage girl and was left with a light sentence. The highly unusual deal he struck with prosecutors said “the United States” would not bring criminal charges against “potential co-conspirators,” which Maxwell’s attorneys say include her.
Ghislaine Maxwell looks on as her defense attorney Laura Menninger questioned “Jane,” one of Jeffrey Epstein’s accusers.
Jane Rosenberg/Reuters
Maxwell’s attorneys have also argued that the deal’s scope covers the entire Justice Department, not just the US Attorney’s office in Florida that struck the deal with Epstein. If there are any ambiguities, they argued, then the judge should have done some fact-finding about the contract negotiations to figure out what the parties intended by its scope.
Manhattan federal prosecutors have argued they were free from any restrictions set by the deal between Florida’s federal prosecutors and Epstein. They also say that Nathan followed the proper procedure to handle Juror 50 and that the verdict was sound.
After the trial, Nathan was elevated by President Joe Biden to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals (she took a break from the trial to travel to Washington, DC, for a confirmation hearing) and will play no role in the appeal hearing.
While Maxwell is in prison — reportedly running a half-marathon, focusing on yoga, and running afoul of alleged Cuban extortionists — lawsuits related to her and Epstein continue to ricochet through the courts.
In January, a judge unsealed thousands of pages of documents related to a lawsuit against her by accuser Virginia Giuffre, which shed some light on how Epsten’s sex-trafficking operation worked.
And last year, JP Morgan Chase and Deutsche Bank, which banked Epstein, settled class-action lawsuits from his victims and claims from the US Virgin Islands, which had alleged they ignored red flags and facilitated his sex-trafficking operation.
If the three-judge panel finds that Maxwell’s lawyers’ arguments have merit, the case may go back to Nathan for a new trial, or for a new sentencing on different terms.
Prosecutors, in the case of a new trial, will have to contend with convincing Maxwell’s victims to testify again about the darkest periods of their life.
One of them, Carolyn Andriano, died in August of a drug overdose. She testified during the trial that she became addicted to “cocaine and pain pills” to make Epstein’s sexual abuse tolerable.
“Marijuana, cocaine, alcohol — anything that could block out for me to go to the appointment,” she said at the trial.
