Ghislaine Maxwell pleads not guilty, refused bail, on sex trafficking charges in Epstein case

Ghislaine Maxwell has been ruled an unacceptable flight risk and refused bail by a NY judge as new details emerge of her arrest.

British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell has pleaded not guilty in a New York court to sex trafficking minors for her former partner, the late financier Jeffrey Epstein.

The 58-year-old denied six charges related to alleged crimes committed by Epstein, a well-connected sex offender who killed himself in prison while awaiting trial last year.

Maxwell appeared in a Manhattan federal court via video link from Brooklyn’s high-security Metropolitan Detention Centre, where she is being held following her arrest this month.

Prosecutors accuse Maxwell, daughter of the late newspaper baron Robert Maxwell, of helping Epstein “recruit, groom and ultimately abuse” multiple underage girls.

The alleged crimes occurred between 1994 and 1997, and relate to three women — one of whom was just 14-years-old when she was sexually abused, according to the indictment.

Maxwell allegedly befriended the girls with shopping and cinema trips, and later coaxed them into giving Epstein nude massages during which he would engage in sex acts.

Ghislaine Maxwell (L) and the late financier Jeffrey Epstein.

Prosecutors say Maxwell sometimes participated in the alleged abuse — which occurred at her London home and at Epstein properties in Manhattan, Palm Beach and New Mexico.

They allege she “persuaded, induced, enticed and coerced” minor victims to travel across US state lines and abroad for the purpose of the illegal sex acts.

Maxwell has been charged with four counts relating to the trafficking, including transporting a minor with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity.

She also faces two counts of perjury for allegedly lying about the claims during a 2016 civil lawsuit.

Ms Maxwell could serve up to 35 years in prison if found guilty.

US District Judge Alison J. Nathan ordered Ms Maxwell, detained in federal custody while she awaits trial. The judge said “the risks are simply too great” to allow Ms Maxwell to remain free, holding that no set of conditions could guarantee she wouldn’t flee.

A trial date has been scheduled for 12 July, 2021.

Lawyers for Ms Maxwell had asked for her release to home confinement on a $US5 million bond secured by a UK property and cosigned by friends and family.

A court sketch of Ghislaine Maxwell.

The Manhattan US attorney’s office, however, urged Judge Nathan to keep Ms Maxwell behind bars, calling her “the very definition of a flight risk”,

In a court filing, prosecutors cited Ms Maxwell’s French citizenship, her “completely opaque” finances and her “access to vast wealth,” adding that she “appears to be skilled at living in hiding.”

Judge Nathan echoed that, saying Ms Maxwell had “demonstrated sophistication in hiding those [financial] resources, and herself.”

Ms Maxwell was arrested July 2 at a remote New Hampshire property that she had purchased in December through a limited-liability company for more than $US1 million in cash, records and court filings show.

In their court filing, prosecutors said agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation who moved in to arrest her encountered a locked gate and private security guards from a company staffed by former British military. Approaching the entrance to the main house, the agents announced themselves and told Ms Maxwell to open the door. Through a window, agents saw Ms Maxwell “try to flee to another room in the house, quickly shutting a door behind her,” prosecutors wrote.

The agents breached the door, finding Ms Maxwell in an interior room, according to prosecutors. While searching the house, agents noticed, on top of a desk, a cellphone wrapped in tin foil — “a seemingly misguided effort to evade detection” by law enforcement, prosecutors wrote.

Ms Maxwell was once a New York socialite in the same rarefied circles as Epstein, whom she dated in the early 1990s. For years, Mr Epstein was trailed by allegations of sexual misconduct, including the abuse of teenage girls, and some women accused Ms. Maxwell of serving as his accomplice and recruiter. She has steadfastly denied the allegations.

The property where Ghislaine Maxwell, former associate of late disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein, was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).

Ms Maxwell’s whereabouts had been the subject of speculation since Epstein’s July 2019 arrest on federal sex-trafficking charges. A month after his arrest, Epstein was found hanged to death in his Manhattan jail cell, and prosecutors shifted their investigation to his associates.

The charges against Ms Maxwell stem from the same investigation, but relate to allegations from 1994 to 1997, roughly a decade before those alleged in Epstein’s case, In a court filing last week, Ms Maxwell’s lawyers said she hadn’t left the US since Epstein’s arrest, and that legal representatives had been in “regular contact with the government.” Her lawyers also sought to distance their client from Epstein, saying she hadn’t been in contact with him for a decade before his death, and to explain her long silence as a bid for privacy and security.

“She did not flee, but rather left the public eye, for the entirely understandable purpose of protecting herself and those close to her from the crush of media and online attention,” her lawyers wrote.

Ghislaine Maxwell was arrested in Bradford, New Hampshire.

Prosecutors pushed back on this argument in their memo. “For years before her arrest in this case, the defendant likely believed she had gotten away with her crimes,” prosecutors wrote. “That illusion has now been shattered, and she has a host of new reasons to use her considerable resources to flee.” Prosecutors also cited Maxwell’s “willingness to brazenly lie under oath about her conduct.” In addition to four counts related to the alleged sexual abuse, Maxwell faces two counts of perjury stemming from a civil lawsuit.

Ms Maxwell hasn’t filled out a financial affidavit, prosecutors said, and hasn’t pledged any cash assets toward her proposed bail package. Such moves, prosecutors said, were “particularly jarring because she appears to have access to millions of dollars, principally in foreign accounts.” Prosecutors have said Ms Maxwell has been associated with more than a dozen bank accounts since 2016, with total balances exceeding $US20 million and large transfers as recently as 2019. As recently as 2011, prosecutors said in their initial bail filing, money moved from accounts controlled by Epstein to accounts associated with Ms Maxwell.

The Wall Street Journal, AFP