Lawyers for Ghislaine Maxwell asked a federal appeals court on March 12 to overturn her 20-year prison sentence for aiding disgraced late financier Jeffrey Epstein in sexually abusing teenage girls and women.
Attorney Diana Fabi Samson argued that Mr. Epstein’s 2007 non-prosecution agreement with federal prosecutors in Florida should have prevented the prosecution of the British socialite.
“Denying the viability of this agreement strikes a dagger in the heart of the trust between the government and its citizens regarding plea agreements,” Ms. Samson said.
However, Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrew Rohrbach said the agreement—which Ms. Samson said applies to her client—“is a promise by the Southern District of Florida not to prosecute Epstein in that district.”
“The phrase ‘United States’ in a plea agreement like this is just a generic reference to the U.S. Attorney’s office that enters into the agreement and is not on its own enough to establish an affirmative appearance,” he said.
Meanwhile, Circuit Judge Raymond Lohier seemed to disagree that “all U.S. attorneys have absolute authority [to] bind other districts” when they make deals with defendants.
“The presumption is that a United States Attorney cannot bind any other office except his or her own office,” the judge said.
According to him, the Florida agreement identified several individuals besides Mr. Epstein who should have been protected under the deal, although Ms. Maxwell wasn’t among them.
The Second U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals hasn’t yet issued a ruling.
Ms. Maxwell once had a romantic relationship with Mr. Epstein, but later became his employee at his five residences, including a Manhattan mansion, the Virgin Islands, and a large estate in Palm Beach, Florida.
She was convicted in late 2021 for luring mostly vulnerable and financially desperate minors to be sexually abused by Mr. Epstein, a wealthy financier with ties to elite figures in the British royal family and the U.S. business and political spheres.
A Manhattan jury convicted Ms. Maxwell on five charges for recruiting and grooming four girls for Mr. Epstein to abuse between 1994 and 2004.
Mr. Epstein was facing sex trafficking charges when he died in a Manhattan jail in 2019. A medical examiner in New York City ruled his death a suicide by hanging. Mr. Epstein had pleaded guilty to sex crimes in 2008 for soliciting a minor for prostitution in Florida.
