New York: “Facts are not persuasive; stories are,” the famed American trial lawyer Gerry Spence – who claims never to have not lost a criminal case in his 50 years practising – once said when asked the secret to winning over a jury.
If Spence is right, Ghislaine Maxwell may well be in trouble.
In this courtroom sketch, Ghislaine Maxwell center, confers with her defense attorney Jeffrey Pagliuca.Credit:AP
After an extraordinarily short opening statement and a shaky first few days, the prosecution seemed to turn it around with blockbuster testimony from three of the British socialite’s alleged victims this past week. Accuser after accuser detailed a pattern of sexual abuse they say they suffered at the hands of Jeffrey Epstein and his “partner-in-crime” Maxwell.
The government served up a gamut of alleged victims; from “Kate”, the Belgravia-born music therapist who was introduced to Maxwell by her then-boyfriend in Paris, to “Jane” the soap actress who met Epstein at a summer camp for gifted children.
But it was “Carolyn”, the drug-addicted teen mother from Florida’s West Palm Beach, who had the jurors’ attention when she took the stand on Tuesday. Her account was so graphic at points that Maxwell’s older brother Kevin shuffled uncomfortably in his front-row seat, bowing his head down almost to his knees.
Her testimony poses the biggest challenge for Maxwell’s defence team, which had portrayed earlier accusers as enamoured of Epstein’s wealth and Maxwell’s charm. Here was Carolyn, an incredibly vulnerable young girl with an absent mother allegedly taken advantage of by the couple for nothing more than a few hundred dollar bills.
Jeffrey Pagliuca, attorney for Ghislane Maxwell, has had to walk a tightrope.Credit:Bloomberg
Jeffrey Pagliuca, chief attorney for the defence, has the unenviable task of challenging the women on cross-examination – a delicate tightrope walk of questioning the inconsistencies in their accounts without appearing too dismissive or uncaring.
Pagliuca spent well over an hour wrestling with Carolyn over minor details about times and dates. No jurors appeared to be making any notes, which can be a bad sign for the defence.
Notably, jurors didn’t take notes during the defence’s cross-examinations of Maxwell’s accusers.Credit:AP
“If the jurors initially believed that they had a truth-teller in front of them when [an accuser] was testifying, it takes a lot on cross-examination to make a jury say, ‘Oh, I’ve been hoodwinked’,” former federal prosecutor Mitchell Epner offered by way of explaining the difficulty of Pagliuca’s job.
Jurors heard earlier in the week from a psychology expert witness who testified that victims of sexual abuse or rape often change their stories as they process trauma.
The case is one of the first high-profile trials to be heard in New York in the wake of the #MeToo movement which brought down Epstein’s friend, film producer Harvey Weinstein. On Maxwell’s federal trial jury, women also outnumber men 8-4, which could well work against her.
That is not to say the government’s case is without its weaknesses. The prosecution rested a week early on Friday after a number of witnesses were dropped from its line-up. In curtailing their case, prosecutors left the jury with lingering questions.
One particularly large elephant in the room was Virginia Roberts Giuffre, one of the financier’s most prominent accusers.
Prominent Epstein accuser Virginia Giuffre has been mentioned repeatedly during the trial, but hasn’t appeared.Credit:Bloomberg
Not only has she made some of the gravest allegations against Epstein, Maxwell and their associate, Prince Andrew, but she introduced her high school friend Carolyn to Epstein. There are photographs of Giuffre with the Prince and pictures at Epstein’s various homes.
Her absence in the room was striking. Giuffre’s name has been brought up at least once a day since the trial started two weeks ago, yet she is not expected to be called by either side to give evidence.
It is not clear what is behind the government’s decision, but some have speculated she would be subject to greater scrutiny and a number of inconsistencies that have featured in the telling, and retelling, of her story over the past decade – in the media and as part of various civil suits she has filed.
But not everyone is so au fait with the cast of characters in this saga, and the jury can only judge on what they have in front of them.
Have they heard enough to convict? We’ll have to wait and see what the defence has in store.
The Telegraph, London
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