A lawyer for Ghislaine Maxwell asked a federal judge to delay the British socialite’s July 12 criminal trial date by at least 90 days, requesting more time to develop a defense for her client following sex-trafficking charges brought by prosecutors in March.
Federal prosecutors filed two sex-trafficking charges against Maxwell on March 29, alleging that between 2001 and 2004, a then-underage victim identified as “Minor Victim-4” gave Epstein multiple nude massages in which the two engaged in sexual acts.
Maxwell “sought to normalize inappropriate and abusive conduct by, among other things, discussing sexual topics in front of Minor Victim-4 and being present when Minor Victim-4 was nude in the massage room of the Palm Beach residence,” the indictment said.
Government prosecutors “effectively added a brand new case on top of the existing case” by introducing the two charges against the former Jeffrey Epstein associate, lawyer Bobbi Sternheim wrote in a letter to Judge Alison Nathan on Thursday.
The defense requires a 90-day continuance, “at the barest minimum,” Sternheim said.
“The defense has been steadfastly and diligently preparing for a July 12th trial based on the original indictment, a date set on the condition that there would be no superseding indictment adding substantive charges,” Sternheim wrote. “The recently filed superseding indictment directly contravenes that agreement and adds two new charges which vastly expand the relevant time period from a four-year period in the 1990s to an eleven-year period stretching from 1994 to 2004.”
“We cannot adequately prepare for a trial containing the new charges and a substantially expanded conspiracy in the less than three months remaining,” the letter continued.
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The charges are compounding difficulties the defense has already experienced in reviewing materials related to the case, Sternheim said, citing technical issues with an FBI-supplied laptop and hard drive that have prevented Maxwell’s legal team from completing a review of some 2,100 “highly confidential” photographs.
Documentation that Sternheim said is necessary to review in light of the charges includes “214,000 photographs, hundreds of hours of audio-visual files, and over 250,000 documents” that the letter said are not easily searchable.
The original indictment on which Maxwell was arrested in July 2020 charged her with conspiracy to entice minors, enticement of a minor, conspiracy to transport minors, transportation of a minor, and perjury.
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Maxwell, who pleaded not guilty to those charges, has been denied bail on multiple occasions. Her arraignment for the two charges is scheduled for April 23.
