The U.S. Department of Justice spoke for hours on Thursday with Ghislaine Maxwell, the former partner of Jeffrey Epstein. The relationship between the British businesswoman and the American businessman always had an air of mystery. Who is Maxwell really?
Maxwell’s cradle stood more than 5,800 kilometers from where she met Epstein. She was born in 1961 near Paris as the ninth and youngest child of a wealthy British family. Her father, Robert Maxwell, was a media magnate and owner of the tabloid Daily Mirror, which meant that Ghislaine spent her youth in the highest social circles in her hometown of Oxford.
In 1991, Maxwell’s life was turned upside down when her father died under mysterious circumstances while on his yacht. Shortly after his death, it became clear that Robert Maxwell had defrauded hundreds of millions in pension funds from his employees to save his faltering business empire.
The loss of her father and the way her family name had been tarnished, both mentally and financially, left a hole in Maxwell’s life. The fraud scandal surrounding her father also tarnished her own reputation in New York, where she had moved a few months earlier.
Maxwell helped Epstein abuse girls
Around that time, Ghislaine Maxwell met Epstein, who at that time was a very successful businessman who belonged to the socioeconomic elite of New York. Among others, Donald Trump and Bill Clinton were among his friends at that time. Not much is known about the first meeting between Epstein and Maxwell, but it is clear that there was a romantic relationship in those early years. Epstein introduced Maxwell at luxury parties as his girlfriend.
In addition, from 1992, Maxwell was given control over a number of Epstein’s assets. She was responsible for personnel policy at those locations. Much later it became known that in that role she recruited underage girls for her partner and boss.
Maxwell contacted vulnerable girls from the area under false pretenses to give massages to Epstein. In practice, it came down to committing sexual acts, sometimes with Epstein and Maxwell at the same time. If the girls resisted, Maxwell threatened them. Sometimes even with death.
What was particularly shocking and only became clear much later is the almost industrial scale on which this happened. Over the years, more than two hundred victims came forward. Later, a former girlfriend of Maxwell would have told Vanity Fair magazine: “When I asked what she thought of all those underage girls, she looked at me and said: ‘They are nothing, these girls. They are trash.'”
‘Best friend’ Maxwell and Epstein separate
A clear beginning and end to the relationship between Epstein and Maxwell cannot be identified. It is often said that Maxwell wanted to marry Epstein, but that he refused. To gain Epstein’s love, Maxwell would help him build his sex empire.
In an interview with Vanity Fair in 2003, Epstein called her his “best friend”. Around that time, the two separated, both business and romantic. However, they remained in contact with each other.
For a long time, Maxwell reaped the benefits of her relationship with Epstein. But that changed in 2006, when the businessman was arrested on suspicion of sex offenses with underage girls. Thanks to a deal with the Justice Department, Epstein ‘only’ had to spend thirteen months in jail.
The deal also included a controversial clause that stipulated that Epstein’s accomplices could not be prosecuted. Maxwell was therefore legally protected, but the negative attention surrounding Epstein also damaged her reputation.
With the establishment of the TerraMar project in 2012 – an initiative to protect the oceans – Maxwell tried to improve her reputation again. But the suspicions and accusations continued to cling to her. In 2016, Maxwell disappeared completely from the public eye, moving from one address to another several times.
Maxwell remained under the radar for a year
Two years later, Epstein was arrested again. Through a series of publications by The Miami Herald, it became clear on what scale Epstein and Maxwell sexually abused underage girls. While awaiting his trial, Epstein committed suicide in 2019 by hanging himself. It never came to a conviction.
After Epstein’s death, no one knew where Maxwell was. She managed to stay under the radar for a year. During that period, the British tabloid The Sun even offered an amount of 10,000 pounds to anyone who had more information about her whereabouts. After a year she was found and arrested.
Two years after her arrest, the court in New York sentenced her to twenty years in prison, which she is currently serving in a prison in Florida. During her trial, Maxwell showed herself to be a “shameless” liar, the prosecutor said. Justice considered it proven that she was “willing” to “break the law to protect herself”. She was therefore found guilty not only of sex offenses, but also of perjury: lying while testifying under oath.
With Maxwell’s conviction, many Epstein victims were able to close the past and start looking to the future. Although Epstein can no longer serve a long prison sentence due to his death, Maxwell’s conviction is an important form of satisfaction for them.
“I have dreamed of this moment for the last ten years, not knowing that it would come,” victim Virginia Giuffre said on the day of Maxwell’s conviction. “It is a bittersweet emotion, because I have had to fight for so long.”