A New York judge on Tuesday denied Ghislaine Maxwell’s bail request and push for home confinement as she awaits trial on sex trafficking charges.
Judge Alison Nathan said the British socialite, accused of sexually abusing and exploiting young girls alongside Jeffrey Epstein, posed too great a flight risk to be allowed to leave.
Maxwell, dressed in a brown top with her hair pulled into a bun, appeared before Nathan via video from the Brooklyn, N.Y., federal detention center.
Nathan said “no combination of conditions” could ensure that Maxwell wouldn’t try to flee, noted her “foreign connections” and added that she exhibited an “extraordinary capacity to evade detection.”
Prosecutors argued against release and said that if given the opportunity, Maxwell would use her collection of international passports, access to private transportation and money to run.
“There will be no trial for the victims if the defendant is afforded the opportunity to flee the jurisdiction, and there is every reason to think that is exactly what she will do if she is released,” prosecutors wrote in a filing ahead of Tuesday’s hearing.
Maxwell is charged with conspiracy and perjury in a multi-state sex trafficking ring involving three unnamed minors between 1994 and 1997.
She has pleaded not guilty to the charges against her. – READ MORE
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