Former New York socialite and convicted sex offender Ghislaine Maxwell seeks to void conviction in Jeffrey Epstein case. Maxwell was convicted of helping Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse teenage girls. Maxwell cited a slew of errors that tainted her trial and said she was immune from prosecution-- she alleged the prosecutors made her a scapegoat because Epstein was dead.
"The government prosecuted Ms. Maxwell as a proxy for Jeffrey Epstein" to satisfy "public outrage" over the case, and worked with his accusers "to develop new allegations out of faded, distorted, and motivated memories", her lawyer Arthur Aidala told Reuters. 61-year-old Maxwell presented her legal documents on Tuesday in a filing with the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan.
Maxwell is currently serving a 20-year sentence. She was, in December 2021, convicted on five charges of recruiting and grooming four girls for Epstein to abuse from 1994 to 2004. Maxwell could be released in July 2037 with credit for good behaviour. Hundreds of women have claimed to be Epstein's victims. In August 2019, Epstein killed himself while awaiting trial in a Manhattan jail cell, a month after being charged with sex trafficking.