Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite, lost her appeal to overturn her sex trafficking conviction in December 2021, clearing the stage for her to be sentenced to decades in jail.
Maxwell, 60, is set to be jailed in June after being found guilty of assisting in the recruitment and sexual abuse of minors for the abuse of dead millionaire Jeffrey Epstein.
On Friday, U.S. Circuit Judge Alison Nathan concluded that testimony and evidence presented during Maxwell’s federal court trial in Manhattan supported three counts of the guilty judgement.
Nathan, on the other hand, overturned the guilty findings on two of the counts, reducing Maxwell’s maximum possible sentence to 55 years in prison.
According to Nathan, three of the counts basically encompassed the same crime, thus only one of the three guilty judgments was upheld.
“This legal conclusion in no way casts doubt on the jury’s factual findings,” Nathan wrote. “Rather, it emphasises the fact that the jury unanimously found the Defendant guilty of collaborating with Epstein to seduce, transfer, and traffic minor females for sexual assault three times over.”
At trial, Maxwell was found guilty on five of the six offences he faced.
Her plea to overturn the conviction was different from an earlier, failed motion for a new trial based on one juror’s refusal to reveal that he had been sexually molested as a kid during jury selection.
Maxwell’s attorneys claimed that if the jury had known about the juror’s background, he would have been removed from the panel. Nathan, on the other hand, came to the conclusion that the jury was not biassed towards Maxwell and that he was a fair and unbiased juror.
While awaiting trial on sex trafficking allegations, Epstein, a known sex offender, committed suicide in his Manhattan prison cell in 2019.
Maxwell’s entourage included Prince Andrew of the United Kingdom, Donald Trump, the former US president and real estate mogul, and the Clinton family.
Virginia Giuffre, who claimed she was trafficked to the prince by Epstein and Maxwell, settled a sexual assault case with Prince Andrew in February. (Reuters/Web Desk)
