Ghislaine Maxwell attacks Justice Department, Epstein's victims and their lawyers

NEW YORK — Ghislaine Maxwell has unleashed a sprawling attack on her criminal case, slamming the Justice Department, victims, their lawyers and the media.

The British socialite filed seven motions late Thursday seeking to dismiss her indictment for grooming victims of Jeffrey Epstein in the mid-1990s and lying under oath. In the defense team’s account, Maxwell is the victim of an unusual Justice Department effort to restore its reputation after repeated failures to hold Epstein accountable.

“In August 2019, Epstein was found dead in his jail cell. His death while in federal custody was not only disturbing, but publicly embarrassing for the government...almost to the day after Epstein died, the barrage of media attention shifted from Epstein to Ms. Maxwell, including in mainstream publications,” attorney Mark Cohen wrote. “She was portrayed as Epstein’s equal—if not his superior—and baselessly caricatured as a villain of near-mythical proportions. The government’s response to the media frenzy was not to adhere to its earlier objective analysis and consideration of the facts, but to feed the frenzy and substitute Ms. Maxwell for Epstein.”

Maxwell, 59, argues that the feds waited too long to arrest her. Many witnesses who would testify on her behalf are dead, including Epstein, her defense team wrote. She also argued that Epstein’s controversial 2007 nonprosecution agreement with Florida prosecutors should protect her from the new charges. The sex offender’s unusually broad deal with the feds allowed him to serve only 13 months in a Palm Beach County jail on state prostitution charges despite evidence he ran an international sex trafficking operation.

“One does not need to engage in complex analysis to understand what has happened here: the government has sought to substitute our client for Jeffrey Epstein, even if it means stretching — and ultimately exceeding — the bounds of the law,” Maxwell’s legal team wrote.

Prosecutors have said they have evidence corroborating victims’ accounts that Maxwell “normalized” Epstein’s abuse and that she at times joined in the abuse. Dozens of women have said Maxwell played a critical role in Epstein’s trafficking scheme as his top recruiter. Her friendship with the likes of Prince Andrew helped Epstein create a facade as a rich, brilliant businessman. In reality, Epstein was a serial abuser of young girls.

Maxwell has said in depositions she was both Epstein’s girlfriend and quasi-employee but didn’t learn about his abuse of girls until the press began investigating.

An exclusive report by the New York Daily News on meetings in 2016 between victims’ attorneys and Manhattan federal prosecutors are also cited in Maxwell’s motions to dismiss her indictment. Maxwell says prominent lawyers, including David Boies, are in cahoots with the feds and further smearing her name to give the government an advantage at trial.

Meanwhile, Maxwell says she’s still in the dark about evidence against her, including the names of her alleged victims and when the abuse occurred.

“The government’s case against her is still shrouded in mystery. Ms. Maxwell has been prevented from knowing even the most fundamental information about the allegations against her, which are based on conduct that allegedly took place over 25 years ago,” her attorney Bobbi Sternheim wrote.

Judge Alison Nathan must rule on Maxwell’s sprawling legal effort. The trial is currently scheduled for July.