Federal prosecutors filed two sex-trafficking charges on Monday against Ghislaine Maxwell, an associate to the late Jeffrey Epstein, expanding the criminal case against her with a fourth alleged victim.
The British socialite, aged 59, is now accused of grooming and paying a 14-year-old girl to engage in sexual acts with Epstein, according to the indictment from federal prosecutors in Manhattan.
Prosecutors allege between 2001 and 2004, the then-teenager, identified as “Minor Victim-4,” gave Epstein multiple nude massages in which the two engaged in sexual acts.
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Maxwell was arrested in July and was initially charged with transporting a minor for the purposes of criminal sexual activity and conspiring to entice minors to travel to engage in illegal sex acts. The July charges did not include sex trafficking.
The superseding indictment said 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 documents also claim she encouraged the teenage victim to “recruit other young females to provide sexualized massages to Epstein.”
“The victims were as young as 14 years old when they were groomed and abused by Maxwell and Epstein, both of whom knew that certain victims were in fact under the age of 18,” the filing added.
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Epstein was arrested in July 2019 and charged with sex trafficking and conspiracy for allegedly abusing girls as young as 14. He pleaded not guilty. But Epstein was found dead in his Manhattan prison cell that August, in what was determined to be a suicide, according to the New York City medical examiner.
Maxwell, who has maintained her innocence and has been denied bail multiple times, is set to stand trial in July.
