NEW YORK: A US federal judge on Monday (Aug 11) rejected the Trump administration’s request to unseal grand jury transcripts from the criminal case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the convicted accomplice of sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
District Judge Paul Engelmayer said there was little in the transcripts that was not already public, and they did not identify anyone other than Maxwell and Epstein as having had sexual contact with underage girls.
The Justice Department had sought to release the records to ease anger among some of President Donald Trump’s supporters, who have long claimed there was a cover-up of Epstein’s crimes and alleged high-level connections.
‘NO THERE THERE’
Engelmayer dismissed the government’s argument that there was “abundant public interest” in the case.
“Its entire premise — that the Maxwell grand jury materials would bring to light meaningful new information about Epstein’s and Maxwell’s crimes, or the Government’s investigation into them — is demonstrably false,” he wrote.
“Insofar as the motion to unseal implies that the grand jury materials are an untapped mine lode of undisclosed information about Epstein or Maxwell or confederates, they definitively are not that,” he said, adding: “There is no ‘there’ there.”
The judge also questioned the administration’s motives, calling them potentially “disingenuous” and suggesting the request could be a diversion rather than a genuine act of transparency.
MAXWELL OPPOSED RELEASE
Maxwell, 63, is serving a 20-year sentence after being convicted in 2021 of recruiting underage girls for Epstein, who died in a New York jail in 2019 while awaiting trial for sex trafficking.
Her lawyers opposed the release of the transcripts, arguing it could affect her ongoing legal appeals.
The Justice Department is also seeking to unseal grand jury records from Epstein’s own case, a request before another judge.
POLITICAL CONTEXT
Trump’s supporters have been vocal about the Epstein case for years. They reacted angrily last month when the FBI and Justice Department said the financier had died by suicide, had not blackmailed prominent figures and did not keep a “client list.”
In a bid to calm the furor, the department sought to release transcripts from the Maxwell and Epstein cases. US Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, formerly Trump’s personal lawyer, recently met Maxwell but has not disclosed the details of their conversation. She has since been moved to a minimum-security prison.
Trump, 79, was once a friend of Epstein, and the Wall Street Journal reported last month that his name appeared among hundreds during a Justice Department review of the so-called “Epstein files.” No evidence of wrongdoing has been presented.
Maxwell remains the only former Epstein associate convicted in connection with his activities, which conspiracy theorists allege included trafficking girls for VIPs and elites.