Sex Crimes: New York City Prosecutor’s Office Accuses Ghislaine Maxwell of Sex Trafficking for Participating in Epstein’s Pedophile Network | Society

Ghislaine Maxwell, the lady of international high society arrested for allegedly facilitating minors to the pedophile plot of Jeffrey Epstein, has suffered a new judicial setback. After having her request for bail repeatedly denied, the woman, in preventive detention since July in a maximum security prison in Brooklyn (New York), faces an accusation for trafficking in minors, the most serious against her to date . The prosecution for the southern district of New York considers her responsible for convincing a girl under 14 to have sex with the tycoon and paying him for it. She is the fourth minor who claims to have been captured by Maxwell, 59.

The accusation maintains that between 2001 and 2004, and repeatedly, the minor gave Epstein naked massages at his residence in Palm Beach (Florida), occasions that the pedophile, who committed suicide in his cell in August 2019 while waiting being tried, he took the opportunity to have sex with her. Prosecutors believe that after the sexual encounter, Maxwell or other Epstein collaborators paid the girl hundreds of dollars and encouraged her to recruit other teenagers, which she allegedly would have done. The initial indictment against Maxwell, in June 2020, contained the testimony of three minors.

Until now, charges of instigation and transport of minors hung over the British, that is, of managing the network, in addition to two conspiracy crimes and another two of perjury, but not that of sex trafficking. She now faces a total of eight charges for which she could be sentenced to life imprisonment. Prosecutors also believe that the criminal activity of Maxwell, daughter of newspaper mogul Robert Maxwell, lasted until 2004, instead of 1997 as the original statement claimed.

The British Maxwell, once sentimental partner of the tycoon Epstein and later a partner and right hand in the domestic administration, is in provisional prison awaiting trial on July 12, in a hearing in which the testimony of 250 witnesses. Last October, his initial statement, from 2016, was released. in which he said he had never witnessed “inappropriate activities with minors” by Epstein, according to the transcript of the testimony, in which he did not reveal the names of others involved. The plot has peppered members of international high society, presumably including Prince Andrew of England, that he has failed to provide convincing explanations for his ties to Epstein.

When she was arrested, after months eluding the action of justice, Maxwell said that the work she did for the businessman and philanthropist consisted of hiring assistants, decorators, cooks, gardeners or those in charge of maintaining the six mansions he owned. “A small part of my job was to occasionally look for therapeutic massage professionals for Jeffrey,” he explained in 2016, “but when I say hire, it is not in the sense that you mean. [captar o reclutar]; I just went to spas and met people, if they went to Jeffrey’s house, he was the one who hired them. I have not hired anyone ”.

The judge in the case, Alison Nathan, has denied Maxwell bail, alleging that he has many means of escape, due to the considerable family fortune, and because he has three passports, including a French one. France does not have an extradition treaty with the US.

Epstein was arrested in July 2019 and committed suicide in the Manhattan prison cell in which he was staying in August of that same year, just a month after being formally accused of abusing dozens of teenagers both in his Manhattan mansion and at his Palm Beach residence and his Virgin Islands property. The scandal caused had all the necessary ingredients to attract media attention: a wealthy and famous sexual predator – Donald Trump and Bill Clinton were among his circle of friends – implicated figures of rank such as Prince Andrew and a rosary of sex slaves, exploited and abused minors, with the necessary assistance of Maxwell.

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