Ghislaine Maxwell hadn’t spoken to Jeffrey Epstein for a decade before he killed himself and is the victim of a smear campaign, her lawyers claim as they beg for her to be released on $5million bail
- Ghislaine Maxwell, 58, argued she should be released on bail Friday
- She insisted she is innocent of all charges brought against her
- Maxwell’s lawyers argued she is not a flight risk and is ‘not Jeffrey Epstein’
- They also said she had not been in contact with pedophile Epstein for more than a decade before he died in a New York prison last year
- Her request was filed in the US District Court in Manhattan eight days after her arrest at her luxury home in New Hampshire last week
- Her lawyers deny she was in hiding and say she ‘maintained regular contact’ with the federal government since the day after Epstein’s arrest
Ghislaine Maxwell should be released on $5million bail because she is ‘not Jeffrey Epstein’, hadn’t contacted the pedophile for more than a decade before he killed himself and is at serious risk of getting COVID-19 in her ‘hell hole’ Brooklyn jail, her lawyers have claimed.
Maxwell, 58, argued she should be released on bail Friday as she insisted she is innocent of all charges brought against her.
Her request was filed in the US District Court in Manhattan eight days after her arrest on charges of luring underage girls so Epstein could sexually abuse them.
Maxwell had been lying low since Epstein’s death last year but was picked up from her luxury home in New Hampshire last week, where authorities said she was hiding out.
Ghislaine Maxwell, pictured in 2013, was arrested last week on six charges of sex trafficking
Maxwell’s lawyers put forward a proposal for her to be released on $5 million bail Friday, secured against property she owns in the UK that is worth $3.75 million.
They claim in the filing that Epstein’s former girlfriend and close contact had not been in contact with the pedophile for over 10 years before his apparent suicide.
These claims come despite filings in a separate lawsuit brought by an Epstein accuser showing Maxwell contacted Epstein over email as recently as 2015.
The documents also claim Maxwell has been the victim of a smear campaign by the media and that it was the media – and not the authorities – that the suspect had been hiding out from for the last year.
They argue she has no criminal record and strongly denies all allegations made against her by the multiple women who have come forward.
‘Epstein died in federal custody, and the media focus quickly shifted to our client – wrongly trying to substitute her for Epstein – even though she’d had no contact with Epstein for more than a decade, had never been charged with a crime or been found liable in any civil litigation, and has always denied any allegations of claimed misconduct,’ her attorney Mark Cohen wrote.
‘Sometimes the simplest point is the most critical one: Ghislaine Maxwell is not Jeffrey Epstein.’
He continued: ‘Ever since Epstein’s arrest, Ms. Maxwell has been at the center of a crushing onslaught of press articles, television specials, and social media posts painting her in the most damning light possible and prejudging her guilt. The sheer volume of media reporting mentioning Ms. Maxwell is staggering.
‘She has seen helicopters flying over her home and reporters hiding in the bushes.’
Her lawyers deny Maxwell was in hiding over the last year and say she ‘maintained regular contact’ with the federal government since the day after Epstein’s arrest.
Authorities have said the British-born socialite was hiding out in the New Hampshire retreat when they stormed in and arrested her last week.
The application also argues Maxwell is at risk of catching coronavirus if she continues to be held behind bars.
A hearing on the bail request is scheduled to take place Tuesday in Manhattan Federal Court.
Maxwell was romantically involved with Jeffrey Epstein from around 1992, but then became his ‘right-hand woman’, managing his property empire and, it is alleged, his trafficking of minors
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