A judge rejected Ghislaine Maxwell’s bid to throw out her conviction and 20-year prison sentence for helping the late financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse teenage girls.
In a decision made public on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer said Maxwell’s claims were all meritless, and all or almost all were frivolous.
Maxwell, 64, who represented herself, challenged her December 2021 conviction and sentence in Manhattan federal court, and sought a writ of habeas corpus declaring her punishment unlawful.
Prosecutors said her latest claims were baseless or filed too late.
Maxwell said many documents disclosed earlier this year through the Epstein Files Transparency Act show that her due process rights were violated because lawyers representing Epstein’s accusers served as “De Facto Prosecutors and agents of the government.”
But the judge said this supposedly “new” evidence was largely irrelevant to Maxwell’s case.
Engelmayer said Maxwell imposed a culture of silence among the staff at Epstein’s multiple homes as the “lady of the house.” Engelmayer says she and Epstein used methods commonly used by child predators and that Maxwell herself participated in such acts.
Engelmayer says Maxwell has not made a substantial showing of a denial of a constitutional right, an appellate review is not warranted and any further appeal would not be taken in good faith.
