Ghislaine Maxwell faces the prospect of spending Christmas Day – her 60th birthday – locked behind bars in ‘hell hole’ prison cell as she awaits verdict on sex trafficking charges
- Ghislaine Maxwell could spend Christmas Day in a 10x12ft prison cell in New York as she awaits a verdict in her high-profile sex trafficking case
- The jury of six men and six women is still out in the third day of deliberation
- If they do not reach a verdict by Thursday, the jury will reconvene after the Christmas holiday
- Maxwell has maintained her innocence and her lawyers have bashed her accusers as motivated by money
A bruised Ghislaine Maxwell is seen in this photo of her alleged mistreatment in prison
Ghislaine Maxwell could spend Christmas Day in a 10x12ft prison cell as she awaits a verdict in her high-profile sex trafficking case.
The jury of six men and six women is still out in the third day of deliberation.
Despite not being found guilty of any of the alleged crimes, Maxwell faces spending Christmas Day – which is also her 60th birthday – behind bars at the Metropolitan Detention Center, what she’s described a ‘hell hole’ and where she’s been held since her arrest in July 2020.
And while court wasn’t meant to be in session on Thursday, December 23, Judge Alison Nathan told the jury that they could deliberate on Thursday if they have not reached a verdict by the end of Wednesday.
If they do not reach a verdict by Thursday, the jury will reconvene after the Christmas holiday.
Maxwell has maintained her innocence and her lawyers have bashed her accusers as having false memory and being motivated by money.
In legal filings earlier this year, Maxwell claimed her treatment in prison is so bad it would be ‘fit for Hannibal Lecter’.
But they are not appropriate for a ’59-year old woman who poses no threat to anyone’, Maxwell’s lawyers claimed.
At one point, Maxwell ‘barricade’ herself in the video conference room in prison with a cart of legal documents, prosecutors claimed and was deemed a ‘security threat’ by blocking the door and preventing guards from accessing the room.
The jury of six men and six women is still out in the third day of deliberation
Ghislaine Maxwell could spend Christmas Day in a 10×12 prison cell in New York as she awaits a verdict in her high-profile sex trafficking case
Pictured: The Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) where Ghislaine Maxwell is being held
On Tuesday – the second day of deliberation – the jurors appeared to be zeroing on two accusers.
They deliberated for the whole day Tuesday and sent four notes to the judge including one which related to Annie Farmer.
They wanted to know if they could use her testimony for two counts of conspiracy to entice and transport an underage girl to engage in sex acts.
Judge Alison Nathan said she would tell them that they could.
Earlier the jury asked to see notes of an FBI interview that Carolyn gave in 2007, the first time she spoke to law enforcement about being abused by Epstein.
Judge Nathan said that it had not been entered into evidence so they could not see it.
However the jury could refer to its mention in Carolyn’s cross examination by the defense.
At 10.10am after just over an hour of deliberating on Tuesday the jury sent their first note.
Judge Alison Nathan said the jury were asking for the transcripts of testimony from Jane, Annie and Carolyn – but did not mention Kate.
Kate is the only accuser whose claims should not be considered crimes as charged in the indictment.
Prosecutor Maurene Comey said that both sides needed to agree to some redactions before giving the transcripts over.
Defense lawyer Bobbi Sternheim agreed.
The jury were not brought out and Judge Nathan said she would give them the transcripts in the deliberation room.
The charges against Ghislaine Maxwell
Count One: Conspiracy to entice a minor to travel to engage in illegal sex acts
Maximum sentence: Five years
Accusers: Jane, Carolyn and Annie
Count Two: Enticing a minor to travel to engage in illegal sex acts
Maximum sentence: Five years
Accuser: Jane
Count Three: Conspiracy to transport a minor with the intent to engage in criminal sexual activity,
Maximum sentence: Five years in prison
Accusers: Jane, Carolyn and Annie Farmer
Count Four: transporting a minor with the intent to engage in criminal sexual activity.
Maximum sentence: 10 years in prison
Accuser: Jane
Count Five: Conspiracy to commit sex trafficking of minors.
Maximum: Five years in prison
Accusers: Carolyn and Virginia
Count Six: Sex trafficking of minors.
Maximum sentence: 40 years in prison
Accuser: Carolyn
Isabel Maxwell stands in front of the press after leaving the Manhattan Federal Court on Tuesday night
Members of the prosecution team at the Ghislaine Maxwell trial walk out of the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse with boxes of papers as the jury deliberates
Maxwell walked into court wearing a black turtleneck sweat and black pants while holding a green folder.
She hugged her lawyers and waved at a young woman in the public gallery.
Maxwell’s defense delivered closing arguments Monday afternoon, telling the jury that she is ‘an innocent woman wrongfully accused of crimes she did not commit.’
The jury of six men and six women deliberated for the whole day and sent four notes to the judge including one which related to Annie Farmer (pictured in a school photo)
In her closing remarks, Maxwell’s lawyer Laura Menninger said: ‘The government has failed to prove any charge beyond a reasonable doubt and the only correct verdict in this case is not guilty on each count.’
The defense again attempted to discredit the accounts of the four accusers, as Menninger stated, ‘The evidence has established what we told you it would, that the stories relied on by the government are erroneous memories, manipulation and money. But in this case the order is reversed. The money brought the accusers to the FBI where their personal injury lawyers sat right there.’
As for how Maxwell was portrayed, Menninger said that she had been made to look like ‘Cruella de Vil and the Devil Wears Prada all wrapped up into one’.
Such a portrait was ‘as old as Hollywood’, Menninger said.
Menninger said, ‘The lawyers manipulated their stories and the government accepted their stories without ever corroborating them.’
Menninger said that ‘suddenly’ the accusers ‘recovered memories years later.’
She said: ‘The recovered memories that Ghislaine was involved, that Ghislaine was there, that Ghislaine was the culprit.’
Menninger said that the prosecution spent a lot of time talking about Epstein’s lifestyle, about his wealth and his property and his private planes ‘just like a sensationalist tabloid would’.
Menninger said that Epstein was a ‘master manipulator’ who ‘abused his money and his power’.
She said: ‘We are not here to defend Jeffrey Epstein, he is not my client’, but she added: ‘Ghislaine Maxwell is not Jeffrey Epstein’.
Menninger claimed that when Epstein died the prosecution ‘pivoted’ to going after Maxwell.
The idea was that ‘Ghislaine was there, she must have known.’
Menninger criticized prosecutors for showing the jury dozens of photos out of 38,000 seized from Epstein’s New York home in 2019.
She said: Where are the other 31,960 photos? Who was in those photos? Was it other girlfriends? Other women?
Nor should the jury draw any inference from Epstein keeping photos of Maxwell. Menninger asked the jury that if an ex boyfriend or girlfriend had photos of them, would that make them a ‘sex offender’?
Menninger condemned the use of such images as ‘straight up sensationalism.’
The couple appear in one photo in what appears to be a European city. Ghislaine is seen kissing Jeffrey on the cheek
Turning to the accusers’ memories, Menninger said that they ‘inserted Ghislaine Maxwell into their narrative’ after they ‘lawyered up’.
Menninger said: ‘You don’t need a lawyer to talk to the FBI’.
Menninger said that it fell to the defense to ask the ‘tough questions’ of the accusers and cross examination had shown that the ‘truth was manipulated and changed over time’ for the purpose of the victims getting a payday.
Menninger went through inconsistencies in the statements by Jane and Carolyn and said that they had suffered from ‘post event suggestion’, as their ‘false memory’ expert Elizabeth Loftus had described it – adding new and false information after the event.
According to Menninger, the prosecution had ‘broken promises’ to produce numerous house staff, family members and other witnesses to back up the claims.
The idea put forward by prosecutors Maxwell became a ‘facilitator of sexual abuse’ for Epstein to maintain her wealthy ‘lifestyle’ was wrong.
Menninger said that Maxwell at the time was a ‘beautiful woman in her 30s’ who was just starting out on her career.
Epstein was ‘manipulating everyone around him’ and ‘dating women behind her (Maxwell’s) back’.
Menninger said that ‘maybe it was Jeffrey who needed Ghislaine and her connections’, rather than her needing him for his money.
Turning to each accuser, Menninger said that Jane was like an ‘actress who forgot her lines’ – Jane is an actress on a soap opera.
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