Ghislaine Maxwell sentenced to 20 years in prison for sex trafficking minor girls for Jeffrey Epstein

Today, June 28, Ghislaine Maxwell, the socialite who was found guilty late last year of aiding financier Jeffrey Epstein in sexually abusing young girls, received a 20-year prison term.

U.S. District Judge Alison J. Nathan announced the verdict by saying, “A sentence of 240 months is sufficient and no graver than required.”

Additionally, Nathan assessed a $750,000 fine, the utmost permitted by statute.

Maxwell and some of her victims were among the people present inside the federal courthouse in lower Manhattan when Nathan spoke.

Nathan said: “Ms. Maxwell directly and repeatedly and over the course of many years participated in a horrific scheme. Ms. Maxwell worked with Epstein to select young victims who were vulnerable.”

The judge said that Maxwell, 60, played a “pivotal” role facilitating “heinous and predatory” abuse.

In December, Maxwell was convicted by a jury on five charges, including sex trafficking, transporting a minor to participate in illegal sex acts and two conspiracy counts.

Federal prosecutors were seeking a sentence of 30 to 55 years in prison.

Before Maxwell’s sentence was handed down, the judge heard impact statements from victims, including Annie Farmer, who had testified she was 16 when Maxwell introduced her to Epstein, and a woman identified as Kate who told jurors that Maxwell once gave her a “schoolgirl” outfit to wear during an encounter with him.

A lawyer for another victim, Virginia Giuffre, read a statement on her behalf that directly addressed Maxwell.

The statement said: “You deserve to spend the rest of your life in a jail cell. You deserve to be trapped in a cage.”

Maxwell has been held in Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center since her arrest at a New Hampshire estate in July 2020.

Epstein committed suicide in prison in 2019 one month after he was indicted on federal sex trafficking charges.

During sentencing, Maxwell was given a chance to address the court and her victims.

She said: “Your honor, it is hard for me to address the court after listening to the pain and anguish expressed in the statements made here today. The terrible impact on the lives of so many women is difficult to hear and even more difficult to absorb, both in its scale and in its extent.

“I believe that Jeffrey Epstein was a manipulative, cunning and controlling man who lived a profoundly compartmentalized life and fooled all of those in his orbit. But today is not about Jeffrey Epstein.”

Maxwell added: “To you, all the victims … I am sorry for the pain that you experienced.”