More about her defence team.

Ghislaine Maxwell’s Legal Team Needs to Mesh in Ugly, Decades-Old Charges

When she walks into a U.S. court next week, Ghislaine Maxwell will confront federal prosecutors with years of experience in New York courts and deep knowledge of the child sex-trafficking allegations surrounding her and her former lover Jeffrey Epstein.

For her own legal team, Maxwell has assembled the mirror image -- attorneys with years of experience practicing in New York courts and also with deep knowledge of the allegations against her and Epstein.

Maxwell’s hired two pairs of law partners, one from New York, the other from Denver. The New Yorkers -- Christopher Everdell and Mark Cohen -- were once federal prosecutors while the Denver duo -- Laura Menninger and Jeffrey Pagliuca -- has defended Maxwell in civil lawsuits by Epstein’s victims.

It’s a savvy approach for a defense that must grapple with decades-old evidence if it hopes to even the odds against the government, said Jennifer Rodgers, a former federal prosecutor in Manhattan who’s not involved in the case.

“Chris and Mark Cohen have just come on the case, they’re going to be scrambling to get up to speed as there’s a lot of evidence and this case dates back to the mid-1990s,” said Rodgers, who once supervised Everdell in the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan. Menninger and Pagliuca “know all the facts, so this seems like a smart strategy.”

Maxwell, the daughter of late British publishing tycoon Robert Maxwell, faces federal charges that she lured girls as young as 14 for sexual encounters with Epstein. Prosecutors say she spent spent years at Epstein’s side and was a central figure in his criminal enterprise. Epstein died in a New York lockup in August, an apparent suicide, but prosecutors in Maxwell’s trial still must present detailed evidence of a sex-trafficking ring and her alleged role as his accomplice.

The first legal clash for Maxwell, 58, is scheduled for next week when she seeks bail and prosecutors ask that she be held in custody for trial. It will be the first public appearance of Maxwell’s legal team.

Maxwell’s lawyers will have to review millions of pages of evidence the U.S. has collected over the decades. While her lawyers haven’t yet disclosed their legal strategy, they’ll have to confront the allegations as well as the emotional testimony from women who’ve come forward and accused Maxwell of engaging in and enabling their abuse.

More than a dozen women accused Epstein of abusing them but according to prosecutors, three were victims of both Maxwell and the financier.

The lawyers didn’t returns calls and emails seeking comment about the case.

Guzman Prosecution

Everdell spent more than a decade working for the government, focusing on complex frauds, cybercrime, terrorism and international narcotics cases. In 2014, the Federal Drug Agent Foundation cited Everdell and his team for their work in the investigation and apprehension of Mexican drug lord Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman.

Cohen served in the federal prosecutors office in Brooklyn, New York, where he was part of a team that convicted Thomas Pitera, a Bonnano organized-crime family hit man known for dismembering his victims.

Both former public defenders with experience in sex-crimes cases, Menninger and Pagliuca have represented Maxwell in civil lawsuits by women who claim she helped Epstein recruit them for underage sex, with Maxwell participating in some of the sexual assaults.

Two years ago, Pagliuca helped defend a Wyoming businessman who was charged with sexually assaulting a young woman who was unconscious in his home. The man was convicted, but the verdict was thrown out on appeal. Menninger, who was a financial analyst at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. before going to Stanford Law School, worked at a top-flight firm in New York before heading to the Colorado public defender’s office.

Marvyn Kornberg, a veteran criminal defense lawyer in New York, said the four will play to each other’s strengths.

“It’s a very smart for the defense to hire and obtain local counsel who can guide them,” he said. Everdell and Cohen “know their way around, they know people in the prosecutor’s office and they can, if they want, try to work out a deal. They can operate with knowledge about what’s going on with the other side, which can’t be done as well by lawyers who practice primarily in Colorado.”

Cohen and Everdell will also be in a good position to analyze and come up with a game plan and how to handle a high-profile, challenging criminal prosecution, said Jonathan Sack, a former colleague of Cohen who worked with him in the Brooklyn U.S. Attorney’s office in the mid-1990s.

“Mark is a thoughtful lawyer who will know his case, understand it and have a good sense of what the prosecution is doing and what the options are for the defense,” Sack said. “He’ll carefully assess the strengths and weaknesses in the government’s case and will have a good feeling for how a jury would view the facts as well as his client.”

As supposedly told by a criminal using a pseudonym to The Sun. Either he made it up or The Sun made it up.

Ghislaine Maxwell 'has tapes of two prominent US politicians having sex with minors' and boasted of 'owning' powerful people, former friend and jewel thief claims

Reminds me of the story of the timorous plumber who supposedly found a "stash" of child porn under Rolf Harris's floorboards in the 1970s and did nothing about it, until supposedly telling police in 2012, with the result that they raided Harris's former home, even before the first of his alleged victims came forward. Maybe this is venturing into tinfoil hat territory, but I wonder if police made this story up and fed it to The Mirror to firm up the justification for them focussing on Rolf Harris.

Rolf Harris home raided months before arrest after plumber found stash of child porn under floorboards

But why would the Police need to "justify" focusing on Rolf Harris and so "plant" a story post conviction? Has there been some suggestion of malfeance on their part in this case that I am unaware of?

Why do you always say, with the exception of Max Clifford, that all sexual assault allegations are false?

An allegation is an allegation and nothing else. To insist that the allegations against Maxwell are false you must have some evidence in your possession, Would you care to to present it to the FBI and the Federal District Court of New York, so that this poor women doesn't get wrongly convicted?

I don't know if you've followed the Epstein story, but Virginia Roberts sued Maxwell back in 2015 for defamation of character and won a substantial out of court settlement. Maxwell believes she has immunity from prosecution stemming from the shady 2008 plea deal and watered-down conviction given to Epstein. For some mysterious reason, all the documents from that case have been sealed by the court. There is also currently speculation that Maxwell has thumb drives containing video footage of prominent people in compromising positions. But of course this could all be just complete bollocks, as the media loves a good story don't they!

wyot wrote:
But why would the Police need to "justify" focusing on Rolf Harris and so "plant" a story post conviction? Has there been some suggestion of malfeance on their part in this case that I am unaware of?
I've no idea whether enabling accusers to streamline their stories would be malfeasance, I suppose that would depend on whether it was deliberate or accidental or involved the police, but I do suspect that this happened in some way. I also think the way in which Rolf Harris's name was released was highly questionable.

www.kingofhits.co.uk/component/option,co...,2/id,192208/#192265

www.kingofhits.co.uk/component/option,co...,2/id,188492/#188517

What I didn't mention in the post in the first of those two links was that Lee was paid for her interviews a year before the trial with the TV programme A Current Affair and women's magazine Woman's Day (source). She also gave an interview to A Current Affair after the verdict.

The Mirror was forced to correct another “porn stash” piece in 2016.

www.rolfharrisisinnocent.com/debunking-the-myths.html

www.mirror.co.uk/corrections-clarifications/rolf-harris-8558948

Good find, md.

From the Daily Mail.

EXCLUSIVE: Jeffrey Epstein victim bashes 'disgusting' new Netflix documentary, claiming producers forced her to film while she was recovering from cancer treatments and says they took advantage of pedophile's survivors



Caption: "Pictured: Farmer in 1996 just after she was allegedly assaulted by Epstein"



Caption: "She's pictured while working for Epstein. She had her hair cut to match Ghislaine Maxwell's style and color."

Something about this doesn't add up. Looking happy in a photo just after allegedly being assaulted. Looking happy again and with a short haircut to match Ghislaine Maxwell's cut. This suggests that she had admired Maxwell's style, at least. From reports online she first met them in summer 1995 and was assaulted by them in summer 1996. Even if she'd had her hair cut short just after meeting Maxwell, would it really have grown to that length in a year?

It looks as if she may have made false allegations against the chair of the New York Academy of Art.

The New York Academy of Art Commissioned a Report That Purports to Discredit Claims That the School Enabled Jeffrey Epstein’s Abuses

The New York Academy of Art is firing back at Maria Farmer, a graduate who accused the institution of enabling the predations of the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, a former academy board member who she says sexually assaulted her and her younger sister in the 1990s. ...

Based on the investigation’s findings, the board now says “that critical aspects of Farmer’s allegations against Guggenheim are untrue.” ...

Farmer first met Epstein at her 1995 thesis show at the academy. She told Artnet News that Guggenheim, who was then dean of students, made the introduction to Epstein and his companion, Ghislaine Maxwell, and urged her to sell a painting to the couple at a discounted price because “‘they are great benefactors of the academy.'” Guggenheim denies that she ever made this introduction or encouraged Farmer to sell work to Epstein.

The report offers as evidence of Guggenheim’s assertion a statement from an anonymous alum who also sold work to Epstein that night and said that Guggenheim wasn’t involved in the transaction. ...

The report draws on more subtle discrepancies elsewhere, including in Farmer’s recollection of a visit that she, other academy alumnae, and Guggenheim paid to Epstein’s New Mexico ranch back in the summer of 1995.

“Farmer has characterized the visit to Epstein’s ranch as a ‘dinner party,'” the report says. “However, evidence supports that the visit occurred during the daytime.” Meanwhile, Farmer recalls Ghislaine Maxwell wearing tweed that day, but another alum remembered her in black. And while Farmer has characterized the encounter as disturbing, a picture taken that day of the alumnae posing next to a truck and smiling is presented in the report as “photographic evidence” that she “enjoyed the experience.” ...

Another focus of the report is a visit that Farmer made in 1996 to the Ohio estate of Leslie Wexner, the billionaire ex-CEO of Victoria’s Secret, where she says she was assaulted by Epstein and Maxwell. She claims she then called Guggenheim and told her what happened, but that Guggenheim blamed her for the assault and hung up.

Guggenheim denies that Farmer ever called her from Ohio. The report did “not find any information” about whether the call did or did not take place, but noted that Farmer has recounted the alleged conversation to media outlets with varying degrees of specificity (sometimes mentioning her sister too, sometimes not), which it says raises “concerns about either her candor or memory.”

Instead, Guggenheim says that Farmer only mentioned the trip later, once she was back in New York, telling Guggenheim that “the creepiest thing happened” to her with Epstein in Ohio. Guggenheim told the investigators that she “responded by telling Farmer, ‘don’t put yourself in those kinds of situations.'” ...
"Creepy" surely is a tad wan as a description of a sexual assault. Perhaps she embellished what actually happened.