The Supreme Court has denied an appeal from Ghislaine Maxwell after the convicted sex trafficker asked the nation’s highest court to review whether prosecutors fairly brought a case against her.
Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence after she was found guilty of recruiting and grooming young women and girls for sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The justices did not provide a reason for Monday’s decision, which was included in a lengthy list of cases that the court has decided to take up or deny as justices begin their new term this month.
“We’re, of course, deeply disappointed that the Supreme Court declined to hear Ghislaine Maxwell’s case,” her attorney David Oscar Markus said in a statement to The Independent. “But this fight isn’t over. Serious legal and factual issues remain, and we will continue to pursue every avenue available to ensure that justice is done.”
Maxwell’s lawyers had argued in court documents that Epstein’s agreement with federal prosecutors in Florida, which included a pledge not to prosecute him or potential co-conspirators, should apply to one of the counts in Maxwell’s case.
The Department of Justice called on the justices to reject that argument, with Solicitor General D. John Sauer arguing that the U.S. attorney who oversaw that agreement would have needed to obtain permission for the terms to apply outside that district; Maxwell was prosecuted in New York.
Prosecutors in New York ultimately brought federal sex trafficking charges against Epstein in 2019, and he was found dead in his jail cell shortly after his arrest that year.
Maxwell was indicted in 2020 for crimes associated with Epstein’s decades-long scheme to recruit young women and girls — some as young as 14 years old — then sexually abuse them.
From 1994 to 2004, Maxwell and Epstein worked together to recruit young girls and entice them to travel to Epstein’s properties, according to prosecutors. During a monthlong trial in 2021, survivors testified in federal court in Manhattan that Maxwell had groomed them, took their passports, and sexually abused them.
President Donald Trump’s relationship with Epstein and Maxwell has come under renewed scrutiny after the Justice Department sought to draw investigations to a close despite the president’s pledge to release the so-called “Epstein files” that critics argue could expose a wider conspiracy implicating powerful figures.
Maxwell, who is now 63, is not scheduled to be released from prison until 2040. Her best chance of early release is a presidential pardon, though legal experts warn that public statements suggesting that a pardon is even remotely on the table could encourage Maxwell to do anything she can to secure one.
Her attorney David Oscar Markus has previously said she would “welcome” one, though she has not formally sought a pardon from Trump. The president has acknowledged his pardoning power but has not committed to giving her one.
In July, the Justice Department determined “no further disclosure” in the Epstein case “would be appropriate or warranted.”
But in an apparent attempt to suppress criticism surrounding the decision, Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche interviewed Maxwell over two days at a Florida courthouse close to the maximum security prison where she was incarcerated.
Maxwell agreed to cooperate with prosecutors, and she was suddenly moved to a minimum security prison in Texas.
In her interview with Blanche, Maxwell said she “absolutely never” saw Trump behave inappropriately with anyone in Epstein’s circle and praised the president for his “extraordinary achievement in becoming the president now.” She also said she “liked him.”
Her lawyers have refused the opportunity for her to voluntarily testify to Congress without assurances that she can receive some form of clemency. In a letter to a Republican-led House Oversight Committee this summer, Maxwell’s attorneys asked for immunity protections — and made another appeal to Trump for clemency.
“If Ms. Maxwell were to receive clemency, she would be willing — and eager — to testify openly and honestly, in public, before Congress in Washington, D.C.,” according to the letter, which Maxwell’s legal team provided to The Independent. “She welcomes the opportunity to share the truth and to dispel the many misconceptions and misstatements that have plagued this case from the beginning.”
House Democrats, meanwhile, are pushing for a vote on a measure that would force the Justice Department to release any remaining files that have not yet been made public in the investigations into Epstein and Maxwell.
House Speaker Mike Johnson has effectively closed the lower chamber of Congress this week as the federal government shutdown continues — and he is delaying a ceremony to swear into office a recently elected Democratic representative who has pledged to be a deciding vote on the measure.
“What are Republicans so afraid of?” Arizona Rep. Adelita Grijalva wrote last week. “One more vote for accountability?”
