Jeffrey Epstein’s imprisoned accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell has requested that the courts overturn her conviction by citing a prior “non-prosecution agreement” that she says she secured from prosecutors.
62-year-old Maxwell was found guilty for her role in Epstein’s sex trafficking operation.
As Slay News reported at the time, she was sentenced in June 2022 to 30 years in prison after being convicted on charges of trafficking and sexually abusing young women and underage girls.
However, lawyers for Maxwell asked a federal appeals court to throw out her convictions on Tuesday.
Maxwell was convicted in federal court in 2021 for her role in procuring teen girls as victims for Epstein between 1994 and 2004.
Her appeal is being heard in the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York.
In a brief filed last year, her attorneys asked the court to review the statute of limitations, an allegation of juror misconduct, and Maxwell’s sentencing.
The lawyers also argue that Maxwell had been granted a prior “non-prosecution agreement” from prosecutors, which they claim the trial violated.
Epstein died in federal custody in 2019 while awaiting his own trial on sex trafficking charges.
Both Maxwell and his brother, Mark Epstein, have publicly doubted the official finding that he hanged himself while alone in his cell.
Maxwell’s lawyers have argued that after Epstein’s death, she became a scapegoat due to outrage over his crimes.
She claims this outrage also extended from the lenient sentence Epstein received in 2008 for a prior child sex conviction – 13 months with work release.
If her appeal fails, Maxwell isn’t eligible for release until July 2037 on multiple counts of child sex trafficking.
She is an inmate at Federal Correctional Institute Tallahassee, a low-security prison in Florida.
Separately, the Epstein saga has received much attention so far in 2024.
Earlier this year, the unsealing of hundreds of documents as part of a civil lawsuit between Maxwell and accuser Virginia Giuffre made headlines.
A civil lawsuit by a dozen other Epstein accusers against the FBI was also filed.
Meanwhile, a new Florida law was passed designed to make previously sealed filings in Epstein’s criminal case public.
The explosive unsealed documents cast renewed scrutiny on a number of figures in Epstein’s inner circle, including former President Bill Clinton and the United Kingdom’s Prince Andrew.
Epstein got a sweetheart plea deal on federal charges in 2008 in connection with that case.
He was only charged with more serious crimes in 2019 after a series of Miami Herald reports unveiled the lenient terms of his initial punishment.
The lenient deal also created the non-prosecution agreement cited in Maxwell’s appeal.
The deal supposedly protected any potential co-conspirators in Epstein’s sex trafficking operation.
However, it remains a mystery why Epstein was granted such leniency in a case involving serious federal crimes.
Nevertheless, federal prosecutors in New York counter that that deal does not bind them.
Epstein struck with a former U.S. attorney in Florida.
Separately, attorneys for at least one of Epstein’s accusers have argued that the deal should be void because it violates the Crime Victims’ Rights Act.
The new Florida law, taking effect on July 1, will allow grand jury testimony from cases involving dead suspects and crimes against children to be made public.
