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Supreme Court rejects appeal from Ghislaine Maxwell
The Supreme Court has rejected an appeal from Ghislaine Maxwell, the imprisoned ex-girlfriend of Jeffrey Epstein. Maxwell is serving 20 years and recently was transferred from a Florida prison to a Texas prison camp. Her lawyers argued that she never should have been tried or convicted for her role in luring teenage girls to be sexually abused by Epstein.
The Supreme Court on Monday rejected an appeal from Ghislaine Maxwell, the imprisoned former girlfriend of Jeffrey Epstein.
Ghislaine Maxwell appeal rejected
Big picture view:
On the first day of their new term, the justices declined to take up a case that would have drawn renewed attention to the sordid sexual-abuse saga.
As is their custom, the justices did not explain why they turned away the appeal.
Trump’s Republican administration had urged the high court to stay out of the case.
The other side:
Lawyers for Maxwell, a British socialite, argued that she never should have been tried or convicted for her role in luring teenage girls to be sexually abused by Epstein, a New York financier.
They contended that a non-prosecution agreement reached in 2007 by federal prosecutors in Miami and Epstein’s lawyers also protected his "potential co-conspirators" from federal charges anywhere in the country.
The backstory:
Maxwell was prosecuted in Manhattan, and the federal appeals court there ruled that the prosecution was proper. A jury found her guilty of sex trafficking a teenage girl, among other charges.
Maxwell’s trial featured accounts of the sexual exploitation of girls as young as 14 told by four women who described being abused as teens in the 1990s and early 2000s at Epstein’s homes.
FILE - Founder, Terrama Ghislaine Maxwell attends the 4th Annual WIE Symposium at Center 548 on September 20, 2013 in New York City. (Photo by Paul Zimmerman/WireImage)
Currently:
She is serving a 20-year prison term, though she was moved from a low-security federal prison in Florida to a minimum-security prison camp in Texas after she was interviewed in July by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche.
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Elizabeth Holmes, Ghislaine Maxwell now at same prison
Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes is serving an 11-year sentence for knowingly misleading investors at the blood-testing company she founded in 2003. Ghislaine Maxwell is serving a 20-year sentence for helping Jeffrey Epstein traffic underage girls.
RELATED: Epstein files latest: Judge denies request to unseal Ghislaine Maxwell transcripts
Epstein files
Meanwhile:
President Donald Trump’s administration has sought to tamp down criticism over its refusal to publicly release more investigative files from Epstein’s case.
The backstory:
Epstein was arrested in 2019 on sex trafficking charges and was accused of sexually abusing dozens of teenage girls. A month later, he was found dead in a New York jail cell in what investigators described as a suicide.
The Epstein case had consumed Trump’s administration following an announcement from the FBI and the Justice Department in July that Epstein had killed himself despite conspiracy theories to the contrary, that a "client list" that Attorney General Pam Bondi had intimated was on her desk did not actually exist, and that no additional documents from the high-profile investigation were suitable to be released.
The announcement produced outrage from conspiracy theorists and Trump supporters who had been hoping to see proof of a government coverup.
RELATED: Epstein victims say they’ll compile their own list: ‘Stay tuned’
Currently:
The Justice Department said its review of evidence in the government’s possession determined that no "further disclosure would be appropriate or warranted."
The Source: Information in this article was taken from The Supreme Court, as reported by The Associated Press. Background information was taken from The Associated Press and previous FOX Television Station reportings. This story was reported from Detroit.