December 28th
By Tuesday we’re entering our fourth day of deliberations.
I arrive just before sunrise, like always (this time, better rested thanks to half a Xanax and a glass of wine on my return flight) wrapped in wooled layers to ward off the biting temperatures we’re up against this morning. 30 degrees and raining (If four weeks in the dead of December in New York has taught me anything, it’s the art of layering. Back in California, it’s a foreign concept.
My kids still rarely if ever wear shoes and think the purpose of necks scarves must be to strangle oneself.
5am
Laura (the fierce French journalist) kindly offers up her car once again to us as refuge, parked across the street for quick, convenient shelter. Lucia and I take the first round sitting together in the dark with our coffees, watching the rain come down, discussing our thoughts on the trial up to this point. We talk about the jury and what we think their latest transcript requests might suggest, the six count conviction definitions, and of course, the weird allure of Ghislaine Maxwell.
The woman we’re all still trying to figure out. Much to no avail.
Lucia admits to falling prey to her magnetic pull in the courtroom early on. Being one of the few people Maxwell sketched at the start of the trial (a footnote detailed in an article for ABC where she was interviewed about this experience) she admits that whenever she considers reporting from the overflow room - to avoid the hassle of snagging that coveted courtroom seat - the fact that she won’t be in the same room with Maxwell, to connect with her presence, is what ultimately sways her decision.
“I catch myself sitting in there, wanting her to look at me,” Lucia says. Explaining how uneasy it makes her, this unshakable desire for this woman - a stranger’s - attention.
“Oh, I think everyone in there feels the same way,'“ I tell her. If anything, it’s a testament to how in house reporting offers unique insight, how nuance makes all the difference. “Had we not been in that room with her for the past month we would never understand the magnetism at play. It makes you understand exactly why she was so successful at luring girls into her orbit. If this person, at 60 years old, can manage this effect on women our age, it’s easy to imagine the power she wielded over faltering teenagers in her 30s, right..?”
Lucia agrees.
Outside, when our 30 minutes is up, and the rain is still coming down, Lucia and I attempt to take shelter under the marbled courthouse overhang.
We sit content for a few minutes before a man in uniform comes over screaming at us to leave. Lucia tells him that we are freezing, explaining the autoimmune disease she suffers from, and how it’s directly affected by these kinds of harsh conditions but the pleading gets us nowhere.
We are soaked to the bone by the time the doors to the courthouse finally open.
9am
Inside the courtroom Ghislaine enters dressed in all black, gripping a bright green binder, waving to a young unknown girl in the gallery who sits behind the Maxwell twins on their designated bench seat. Isabel, in her maroon beret, a swoop of a blue scarf around her neck. Christine, clutching a small black Chanel handbag.
Kevin Maxwell arrives shortly thereafter. Greeted with a slight nod from Ghislaine.
The mood is noticeably deflated amid talk of the Omicron variant as increasing threat. Judge Nathan is visibly stressed by the spiking cases throughout the city, suggesting that under such circumstance the jurors might need to work every day, including the weekend leading up to and after New Years if they can’t reach a verdict by Wednesday.
“We are very simply at a different place regarding the pandemic than we were only one week ago and we now face a high and escalating risk that jurors and/or trial participants may need to quarantine, thus disrupting trial (and) putting at risk our ability to complete this trial," she tells the court.
The Defense argues this urging. Specially, how to phrase it without pressuring the jury to wrap up deliberations before they’re ready. The longer they deliberate, after all, the better it looks for their client.
"We would object to trying to urge them to stay later if they are not asking to do so and aren’t expressing any difficulty in proceeding with the deliberations that they are currently undertaking," Lara Menninger says. Noting the jury “is continuing their requests for transcripts of trial testimony and other materials that indicate they are working diligently.”
12pm
The hours following the morning discussions are slow and uneventful. By noon my court notes are still empty. Save for the daily beret reference, the Omicron issue, and a few awful attempts at inked court portraits of the attorneys.
By mid afternoon everyone is growing restless.
In the back row the topic of discussion is the little black book. A few of us trying to recall which celebrity names have been publicly revealed, while taking bets on who the lingering redactions might be. Someone mentions Bill Clinton, noting his flight logs still tops the list. The flight facts lead to talk of previous rape charges. How many times he’s been accused of sexual assault and/or sexual misconduct by several women over the past few decades: Juanita Broaddrick in 1978; Leslie Millwee in 1980; and Paula Jones (for exposing himself) in 1991, and Kathleen Willey (for groping her without her consent) in 1993.
I ask if they know anything about the long standing rumors of the Maxwell / Clinton affair. None of them do. So I indulge them with the theory that Bill’s affinity for Epstein was actually (initially) a front for his crush on Ghislaine. Explaining how the media has never really examined the validity of the alleged affair that took them around the world on several occasions, guised as “business ventures” for foundation events and charity ties.
I bring up the Virginia vs. Ghislaine court documents which exposed Clinton’s visits to the island of “Little St. James” that he had previously “categorically” denied. His personal chauffeur on those trips? Ghislaine Maxwell. Via a new shiny black helicopter gifted by Epstein. Back in the states, I tell them Bill was even spotted on multiple occasions visiting her at her NY townhouse, and the two of them seen out to dinner at a fancy Italian diner in Manhattan sometime around 2002.
This little slice of gossip is a hit. If only because we’re all slumping into a mid day crash and - on this particular hour - good gossip replaces caffeine.
Later, Christine Cornel sits down beside me as I’m discussing the possibility of a New Year's Eve strategy with Joe (the beloved Brooklynn Marshall) should we all end up stuck together in this room for the holiday. A plan Joe is easily entertained by. He’s telling me that “technically” there is no law prohibiting alcohol in the courthouse. And casually mentions how easy flasks get through security.
I don’t ask how he knows this but I go ahead and add the gold glittered 2022 party headbands to my amazon cart just to be prepared.
Christine, on the other end of this conversation, has a question for me. She wants to know exactly what I “think” about “everything”
“You mean the trial?” I say.
“Yes, about everything, because I myself am pretty ambivalent about all of it,” she tells me. Except that an hour later I find out she’s anything but.
Over the past four weeks I’ve come to like and trust Christine Cornel. I’m hypnotized watching her sketches come to life in real time, her hands moving effortlessly across the page, framing slices of these courtroom scenes and the fleeting emotions on the faces of everyone in front of us with honest, accurate reflection.
Today the scene on her 3ft x 3ft paper is that of 12 empty juror seats. Portrait of a waiting game.
I take a brief pause before unloading all of my thoughts on her, which I realize in that moment, I haven’t really fleshed out for anyone in this room prior to Christine’s inquiry. Operating mostly as a sponge inside these walls, soaking up the stories and theories all the others toss around daily.
“I think she’s guilty,” I say. “Of the crimes she’s accused of. She definitely knew what he (Epstein) was into, and what was going on with those girls. She was a sophisticated groomer. Equipped with exceptional charm, wealth, and good looks. They trust her and she made them feel special and comfortable in a situation that should have otherwise alerted sharper intuitive senses. So definitely instrumental in normalizing the perversity of the whole thing. But…”
I hesitate for a moment before continuing
“I also don’t know that I could personally convict her based on the evidence presented. From a moral and legal perspective, my views are conflicting. I also see her as a victim herself, in a way. Based on her backstory, fueling that driving desire to please men like him, who ultimately destroy everyone and everything around them in the end… you know...?”
“Classic Freudian tragedy,” I say.
Christine nods. So I continue.
“She’s also a scapegoat, in my opinion, for all the powerful people involved who need this to die with her name solely attached to it. How convenient, to send one woman down for the whole thing.”
When I stop, I see Christine staring blankly back at me, her eyes unblinking. I can’t tell if I’ve offended or confused her. She takes a long pause.
“This is exactly what I told a couple people in here last week. And they stopped speaking to me because of it,” she says, shaking her head slightly.
Then smiles and extends a warm invitation to lunch.
1pm
At the organic Chinese spot around the corner from the court (her daily go-to during these working weeks) we sit together at a makeshift booth outside in a tent framed by plastic, surrounded by bowls of hot noodles, spring rolls, tea, and steamed vegetables. From across the table I realize why she’s always looked so familiar to me. Her features resemble an aged Uma Thurman. Pretty, with a distinct nose, thin blonde hair and big pale eyes. Wearing hand carved jewelry and hand dyed shawls. She looks like the artist she is.
She tells me about her daughter whom she’s helping out with school. How flighty she can be losing her bank cards and wallets all the time. I laugh and tell her if she’s anything like me it’s a tragic flaw she likely won't outgrow. As I’m sitting there with Apple Pay as my last financial option, after losing my 6th or 7th debit card of the year. So many I finally stopped counting.
When she sees that I’m disappointed in my choice of soup, she offers me a taste of hers. Pushing her bowl over to me, handing her spoon along with it. An offer that feels almost criminal in the age of stringent covid precautions.
After lunch we start to make our way back from China Town to the courthouse. Strolling though brightly painted brick walls and street side lunch cafes. On the walk back Christine tells me she believes in the secret love child of Jeffery and Ghislaine. A conspiracy recklessly shaped during the trial, when Carolyn mistook a framed photo of a naked, very pregnant Eva Dubin, to be Ghislaine Maxwell 25 years ago. This one I don’t bother to correct her on.
“You know, I went though a few situations like that myself as a young girl,” She says, switching to the topic of Annie Farmer’s testimony. “Who hasn’t?”
I listen without answering back because I know her rationale is attached to ideals from another era, rightfully outdated by ones we hold today. In all honesty I’m not particularly interested in judging or debating anyone’s take on this trial. I’ve come to appreciate how we all have varying insight and opinions about nearly every aspect of it. The black and white decidedness, on almost anything these days, is what I loathe most.
She brings up another point I hadn’t considered. About the masks, explaining how they strip us of readable human emotion. She thinks it’s “terrible” that Ghislaine is forced to wear her mask as a defendant in court because it sets an unbalanced perception of the defendant, who needs every working aspect to “humanize” them in front of a jury.
“People don’t innately trust each other in masks.” She says, “Our brain is not hard wired that way.” She goes on describing how the Russians display their defendant in a plastic cube - unmasked - so the jury can still “read the emotions” on their face. A detail I’m tempted to fact check, but never do.
“Emotion seems to be the very thing Ghislaine is sorely lacking, don’t you think?” I ask. “I don’t think anyone in there relates to her. She seems too cut off and disconnected from any trace of feeling or emotion. If she’s not engaged with her family, she’s stone cold and unmoving. The jury picks up on it, just like we do,” I tell her.
When I realize how long we’ve overstayed our lunch hour (hangin on the edge of an unpredictable verdict, no less) Christine assures me that we have time, that a verdict never arrives without a note from jurors asking to clarify the charges first. “They always ask that first” she says.
“They need final clarification. Until we get that, a verdict ain’t happening, babe.”
4pm
She’s right. Around 4:30pm we finally get word of a note. But it’s not a verdict. The jury is simply rejecting the offer to stay late, per judge’s request.
“Our deliberations are moving along and we are making progress," the note reads. Asking that they be allowed to resume the following day instead of staying an hour later.
The waiting game continues.
5pm
Outside the courthouse, bathed in a flurry of flashing bulbs trailing her exit, Isabel Maxwell heads towards the curb handing out a box of leftover pizza to a flock of confused reporters.
“I’m quite serious, this is real” she tells them, placing the bagged pizza on the ground at their feet.
When one of the reporters asks why she’s bringing pizza to journalists, she answers with a shrug. As if to say “why not?”
Watching this whole scene unfold I can’t help but imagine what the crew in overflow will have to say about this Pizza peace offering tomorrow. The handoff, captured by a throng of Twitterheads.
Pizza, of all things I think to myself, they are going to have a conspiracy field day with the accidental symbolism Isabel Maxwell just served to them. After all, with the pizza gate overflow crew, all it takes are a few crumbs.
When I make my way to where my Uber is set to arrive I see Isabel and Leah Saffian side by side waiting on their car, being bombarded with questions about Robert Maxwell’s alleged involvement with stealing the atom bomb for Israeli intelligence. Everyday, a different (scandalous) topic is tossed at them by online reporters eager for a juicy vlog teaser.
A woman next to me is holding a poster outfitted with clippings about sex trafficking crimes in the city. She chants “Save the children” over and over and over again.
When their car finally arrives Isabel and Leah rush in and drive away.
Out of frame a handful of reporters are carefully inspecting the white cardboard pizza box Maxwell has given them. As if a bomb of some sort might be tucked inside.
December 29th
9am
The morning brings immediate chaos.
Upstairs, outside the courtroom I am one of only a couple people in the hallway. Everyone else has filtered off to other areas of the courthouse seeing how shapeless the deliberation days typically prove. I notice Julie K. Brown in the hallway talking to a blonde woman in a two piece suit. Both of them look bothered. The woman, I recognize, is an alleged victim of Epstein’s. I’m told the backpack she carries with her includes lingerie and a gown purchased for her by Epstein.
I figure all of this must have to do with Brown’s latest piece for the Miami Herald that broke right after court wrapped yesterday evening, which Leslie has only partially filled me in on. This woman’s face is the one on the cover under the headline.
“As Ghislaine Maxwell’s Family is escorted into the courthouse, an accuser waits in the cold” the article’s tag line reads. A piece meant to highlight how classism in this case filters all the way down to the bottom. From Epstein's privileged FBI protection and legal avoidance, to his Madam’s court trial 20 years later.
Suggesting the law - even after all we know now - still caters to the rich.
She writes the victims are not allowed in the courtroom unless they wait out in the freezing cold like the other citizens. While the Maxwell family members are escorted in and treated “like royalty.”
Joe calls this “bullshit.” He says the Maxwells have never been escorted in, and that the front bench is always reserved for the defendants family members. He says the victim hasn’t been cleared by the court, therefore cannot be included unless she follows the proper protocol.
When I follow Julie back inside the courtroom she walks directly over to the court official demanding he answer why this woman is not allowed to sit in on the day’s proceedings like the rest of us. The conversation between them escalates quickly. Within a matter of minutes they are both shouting at one another. She’s demanding explanations, he’s demanding she back away from the “Well” - yelling for security as she inches towards him.
“She, is, not, a victim!” The man shouts again. He argues that this woman doesn’t have clearance, or a lawyer, and hasn’t been recognized by the Epstein fund. Therefore cannot be granted entrance to the courtroom simply based on personal claims.
He tells Brown that his job title does not allow him to override these rules even if he “wanted to.”
When Brown exits the courtroom she announces that she is emailing the judge to address the matter as the woman in the suit follows behind her.
The man from behind the well shouts back at her “Good! I’m sure you can write a story about this too!”
“These are the stories they pay me to write,” Brown tells me, as she slips into an elevator.
10am
An hour later a note from the jury is handed over, requesting transcripts of Carolyn, Annie and Kate. As well as the memory skeptic the defense called to raise questions about the victim’s “faulty” memories.
The set of requests sends the defense reeling. The team is ecstatic seeing how these inquiries lean in strong favor of their case. Combined with what appears to be a growing deadlock, reexamining the transcripts of faulty memory claims, feels promising for them.
A light in Ghislaine flicks on instantly. The charm is turned up to the point she is almost giddy in her demeanor. Inhabiting the mannerisms of the world class hostess we’ve all heard and read about. When she leans back into her chair, stretching her arm along the length of it, elbow draped, it looks as if she’s awaiting a glass of champagne to be handed to her. Or posing for the sketch artists, looking undeniably regal in these old habits, but under such strange circumstance.
“Well look at this, Good time Ghislaine has arrived” Leslie leans over and whispers as the two of us sit watching her chat with her sister and Saffian (who are dividing their attention between Ghislaine and whatever is on their phone screens)
Laura Menninger appears equally amped. Smiling and shooting fingers at Maxwell in a cute, playful gesture.
“It’s like we’re guests at her cocktail party,” Leslie says, scanning the absurdity in the scene before us.
Following this mid day peak, Saffian waves down James Hill. A handsome, silver haired reporter for ABC who has interviewed both of the Maxwell Brothers in the past. Hill rushes over to the front bench where they all gather in a circle whispering amongst themselves with every eye in the room following them.
Saffian then leads him over to Ghislaine, initiating an introduction between the two. When he hunches down beside her, her mask comes down to show she’s smiling back at him. They are face to face and the whole room, like a cartoon, starts to shrink around them, inch by inch the crowd scoots closer and closer, to the point every journalist in there is literally leaning into the corner of this conversation, trying to hear what it is they are discussing.
“Omg, She’s literally setting up her post bail interviews” Leslie says.
“It certainly appears that way.”
After a few minutes and a lot of head shaking and flashy smiles, a marshall finally notices the conversation at the front of the court and briskly walks over to break it up. Ghislaine then looks directly at all of us and mutters something about how she’s more than willing to talk to media but must run it by her attorneys first.
With a quick smile she pulls a black mask back over her face and turns around to face the judge who is now approaching.
“What the fuck was that?” Someone whispers, indirectly to Hill.
“I’m not telling you what she said,” He snaps, climbing back into his seat. A snide grin on his face to match a newly inflated ego.
“I would have done the exact same thing” Julie K. Brown whispers to us from a bench in front. “Any of us would have.”
2pm
A second note changes everything. This time the jury is asking if they can convict Maxwell on one of the heftiest counts she’s charged with based on a particular victim’s testimony.
Instantly the mood in the room shifts. The defense is stunned, Bobbi Sternheim is seen rubbing Ghislaine’s back, and Menninger at the mic is frantically debating how best to respond to such an unexpected inquiry.
4pm
Two hours later, an hour to the day’s deadline, we are all confused. No one, after a day of such dizzying twists, is anticipating a verdict by 5pm.
On the bench outside the courtroom, I’m splayed out like a child on my stomach, playing an old word game Christine is eager to teach me. A game her cousin taught her when she was a teenager. One I’m guessing she’s won ever since.
In between word scrambles we talk about the rules of her job. How the sketchers in the court are there to offer unbiased accounts of the court. With presumed innocence as the defining goal. She tells me they are not allowed to stray from realistic angles. Or improvise with artistic abstractions. Or add anything that isn’t actually in frame.
She tells me about one instance a decade ago where the court artists only had 15 minutes to capture each of the 50 victims taking the stand. Under the pressure of time constraints she made the creative call to place her favorite of the witnesses (an old man, a farmer who’s emotion she saw as the most moving of the bunch) at the center of the frame, while placing each of the other 49 victims in smaller portraits behind him.
It was a decision she says nearly cost her her career, when a reporter called asking why she choose that arrangement and she answered him honestly, it prompted a headline that accused her of falsifying documentation, something along the lines of “Inside the Fake Art of Court Sketching” - describing the manipulation of this particular portrait as main example.
An accusation she says, she never really got over.
4:40pm
Just as we are wrapping up our word game we notice people suddenly moving swiftly amongst the halls. We see Marshalls and reporters hurriedly making their way back inside the room. So we hop off the bench and follow them. Inside FBI agents are starting to line the back wall. Everyone is whispering, wondering what’s going on.
“I think it’s a verdict,” someone says. The room falls silent.
Maxwell’s family suddenly appears. All four siblings shoulder to shoulder. Christine drops her head, Isabel stares straight ahead.
Ghislaine is brought in, and takes her seat without acknowledging anyone in the court. Not even her sisters who are now intently focused on her.
Judge Nathan enters the room and abruptly and announces to the court that “we have a verdict.”
As she opens the envelope to read the fate of Ghislaine Maxwell, all eyes fall on the her. She sits straight up, unmoving. Looking only briefly across at the jury sitting directly across from her.
Judge Nathan reads the verdict
“Count 1 - GUILTY: Conspiracy to Entice Minors to Travel to Engage in Illegal SexActs
Count 2 - NOT GUILTY: Enticement of a Minor to Travel to Engage in Illegal SexActs
Count 3 - GUILTY: Conspiracy to Transport Minors with Intent to Engage in Criminal Sexual Activity
Count 4 - GUILTY: Transportation of a Minor with Intent to Engage in Criminal Sexual Activity
Count 5 - GUILTY: Sex Trafficking Conspiracy
Count 6 - GUILTY: Sex Trafficking of a Minor”
In less than 40 seconds, a woman’s fate is sealed. Ghislaine’s reaction is almost mechanical. She pours water from a plastic bottle into a styrofoam cup and takes one big long drink from it. Her stance remains entirely unaffected. We see her glance briefly down at her feet before struggling, momentarily, to stand as the judge thanks the jury upon their release.
When the jurors exit she stands, then shoots one last glance at her family, a look entirely devoid of any notable emotion, before being escorted by two court Marshalls through the back door to the holding cell where she will sit, awaiting transfer to the MDC prison in Brooklynn that she’s been housed at for the past 578 days.
With the jury gone, the reporters rush out of the room while the Maxwell family sits for a minute in silence.
5:20pm
Upon exiting the courthouse we are greeted by a flood of flashing lights firing as we make our way down the concrete stairway. The crowd out front is chanting and cheering, as if their favorite sports team just won a championship. All I can see are a smattering of faces doused in white flashes, celebrating “justice” secured by news of the guilty verdict.
The reporters out front are frantically setting up microphones, arranging background shots and interviewing contributing parties who were in there for the reading of the verdict.
Around the corner the Maxwell family exits from the side, the four of them locked arm in arm as they climb over metal barricades to escape the swarm of paparazzi trailing after them.
Bobbi Sternheim is the only one who stops to address the media. With countless microphones at her face she declares the verdict a great disappointment and vows a continued fight for Maxwell’s innocence by way of appeals.
Minutes after this statement, a tweet on my phone alerts me of a response from Virginia Giuffre
"My soul yearned for justice for years and today the jury gave me just that. I will remember this day always, Having lived with the horrors of Maxwell's abuse, my heart goes out to the many other girls and young women who suffered at her hands and whose lives she destroyed."
8pm
When we arrive at Oden, the restaurant Leslie chooses as our meeting spot, 12 of us who have connected over the course of the trial, finally sit together for a meal. The first in 4 weeks.
The waiter is gracious and informs us that champagne is on the house because the manger is a “big fan” of the coverage this crew has provided.
When Julie K. Brown walks in she is greeted with standing applause.
“Get the woman a stiff drink” the manger tells a server.
After an evening unwinding with new friends and delicious food and half drunk laughter, I bid everyone farewell and walk out to call a car home. As I’m scrolling through Instagram one targeted ad catches my eye, a promotional video advertising Bill Clinton’s latest venture, a master class he’s teaching on “inclusive leadership.”
“Learn how to be an effective, empathetic leader. Learn how to assemble, inspire, and enpower diverse teams, mediate conflict, manage criticism and create a personal framework to guide you and your team towards a shared vision.”
Some things, I think to myself on the quiet car ride back, never change.
Thanks Jessica, I’m amazed at your detail and ability to get everything across, I felt like I was there too reading that! 👏🏻Also..intrigued by Christine and her word game..! Xx
So good!