In 9 Days I'll Be In A Manhattan Courtroom For Ghislaine Maxwell’s Appeal Hearing

Here's a new video that conveniently condenses details of her layered life story leading up to Epstein

“The Government questions why Epstein would have sought a broader grant of immunity for co-conspirators than for himself. The line prosecutor remembered was that defense counsel told her that “Epstein wanted to make sure that he’s the only one who takes the blame for what  happened.”

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On March 12, the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan will host oral arguments in the appeal of Ghislaine Maxwell, nearly two years after it was filed.

Ghislaine is not expected to be present for the hearing, though some speculate she could appear via zoom link or by phone.

This will be my first appellate court experience— notes I’ll be sharing here with you all, of course. Expect in that some some old sources to resurface.

Leading up to this concluding chapter, I’ll also be adding the last 2 parts of my series on Ghislaine later this week. Her character tracking has spanned nearly two years. Recap of her trial, as some of you might already know, is the reason this newsletter was born. The last posts will include details of a secret suburban San Diego stint + prison notes from an anonymous source in her unit who mysteriously dropped out of communication in recent weeks.

For now, I’m including a few appeal highlights as well as a long video that I think succinctly summarizes the complexities of her long, twisted saga as a refresher for newer readers.

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KEY POINTS

• A three-judge panel in the appeals court will hear oral arguments in Maxwell’s appeal on March 12

• Maxwell was convicted on five counts of sex trafficking + other crimes in late 2021 for her role in grooming and recruiting girls to be abused by Epstein. She was sentenced to 20 years in prison + five years of probation + a $750,000 fine.

• Maxwell appealed the conviction in July 2022— arguing the conviction should be reversed in part because one of the jurors was a victim of sexual abuse but didn’t disclose that information and because “the court erred” in her sentencing. She also argues that she was prosecuted “to satisfy public outrage” after Epstein’s mysterious death.

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APPEAL HIGHLIGHTS

• “Ms. Maxwell argues that she is a third-party beneficiary of the non prosecution agreement (hereinafter, “NPA”) and, as such, has standing to enforce  the co-conspirator immunity provision which, by its terms, barred this prosecution.”

• “Ms. Maxwell further argues that the District Court’s findings and conclusions  concerning Juror 50 were an abuse of discretion in three respects: (1) Juror 50’s  explanations for his false answers to a juror questionnaire were incredible on their  face; (2) Juror 50’s concealed traumatic experience as a victim of childhood sexual  abuse under circumstances analogous to the experiences of the Government  witnesses, if known during voir dire, would have provided a valid basis for a  challenge for cause; and (3) the Court abandoned its obligation to ascertain not  merely the juror’s credibility, but also the validity of a challenge for cause, when it  unduly narrowed the scope of its examination of Juror 50 at the post-trial hearing.”

• “Ms. Maxwell argues that the District Court’s sentence was in error because  (1) its four-point enhancement under USSG Section 3B1.1 lacked any support in the  record that Ms. Maxwell supervised another criminal participant; and (2) its  sentencing decision was predicated on a miscalculation of the applicable guideline  range for incarceration and fines in the first instance and a subsequent failure to  correct its error by either recalculating the sentence so as to comport with the proper  guideline range or provide reasons for its upward departure.”

• “Juror 50 testified that he inadvertently answered incorrectly all, and only, the questions  that would have elicited information about his child sexual abuse.⁶In response to the  Court’s inquiry as to whether he could have been fair and impartial, he replied by  rote in the affirmative. His answers and explanations were incredible, ever shifting,  and even outright contradictory. He attributed his false answers to having simply  misread questions because he was tired and distracted, but then claimed that one  answer was predicated on his view that a stepbrother was not a family member, and  another, on his view that he did not consider that his sexual assault made him a  victim of a crime (A268) – an explanation that made sense only if he had actually  read and understood the questions in the first instance.

• “Juror 50’s pretrial selective false answers only to questions that would have  elicited his child sexual abuse, his post-verdict activity, and his patently false and  contradictory explanations in the post-verdict hearing should have disqualified him  for service as a juror in this case.”

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DeSantis Signs Legislation to Authorize The Release of Jeffrey Epstein Grand Jury Documents

Last week, Ron DeSantis signed a bipartisan bill into law authorizing the release of grand jury transcripts from an investigation into Jeffrey Epstein. The new legislation— signed by DeSantis on Thursday— will allow a public release of the jury’s transcripts from the 2006 probe into Epstein’s abuse of underage girls. The new measure goes into effect July 1.

“But we had a few of the — they’re now women, they’re in their 30s — but they were teenagers, a lot of them I think were 14 at the time. And his has been something that has stayed with them for decades and they never got any justice. And so now we’re going to get more facts. And how is it, Sean, when you have so many people involved, you have one person now, Ghislaine Maxwell, who’s in federal prison? Nobody else has been held accountable since Epstein’s death. And I think everybody knows that is not right and there’s no way that no body else was involved in this criminal activity.” — R. DeSantis

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“Didnt expect to go into this feeling bad about Ghislaine's childhood. But here we are. And I guess I shouldn't be surprised. You don't turn to a predator for comfort and partnership and bring him underage girls if you had a healthy childhood. I like that you covered her childhood. It is so important that we understand what things increase the chances of someone becoming a predator or other type of criminal. These are the things that help us do better with future generations.”

— YouTube Comment