Ghislaine Maxwell loses appeal against sex trafficking conviction
A federal appeals court on Tuesday upheld the sex trafficking conviction of the former British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell, rejecting her appeal.
Maxwell, 62, was arrested in 2020 and charged with involvement in her ex-boyfriend Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual abuse of teenage girls.
In 2021, Maxwell was found guilty of sex trafficking in a Manhattan federal court trial, where she was convicted on five of the six charges she faced for having recruited and groomed four underage girls for Epstein to abuse between 1994 and 2004.
In 2022, she was sentenced to 20 years behind bars.
In the new judgment, filed on Tuesday at Manhattan’s second US circuit court of appeals and viewed by the Guardian, the appeals court affirmed and upheld Maxwell’s convictions and described her sentence as “procedurally reasonable”.
Maxwell appealed her conviction after she was sentenced in 2022, and has argued that she ought to be immune from prosecution due to a non-prosecution agreement federal prosecutors in Florida arranged with Epstein in 2007.
In the judgement on Tuesday, the court wrote the alleged crimes fell within the statute of limitations and that the agreement did not cover Maxwell.
Maxwell has been serving her sentenced at a low-security prison in Tallahassee and she is eligible for release on 17 July 2037.
• Information and support for anyone affected by rape or sexual abuse issues is available from the following organisations. In the US, Rainn offers support on 800-656-4673. In the UK, Rape Crisis offers support on 0808 500 2222. In Australia, support is available at 1800Respect (1800 737 732). Other international helplines can be found at ibiblio.org/rcip/internl.html