Bail denied again: How’s Ghislaine Maxwell faring in jail now?
Now, for the second time while awaiting trial, longtime Jeffrey Epstein associate and alleged “madam-in-chief”, Ghislaine Maxwell, has been denied bail. Maxwell’s currently being held on several counts relating to Epstein’s sex trafficking operation, including enticement of minors, sex trafficking, and perjury.
Like her last petition for bail, Ghislaine Maxwell’s request this time would have her out for the holidays. Maxwell & her defense team argued her time at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn was full of “onerous conditions” such as being in solitary confinement and subjected to strip searches. However, The Daily Beast reported that on Friday, prosecutors told a different story about Maxwell’s stay behind bars.
Club Fed?
In a court brief Friday, prosecutors called Ghislaine Maxwell’s stay at the MDC “relatively cushy”, detailing the heiress had been granted “thirteen hours out of her cell each day, a private shower, and access to her own phone, two computers, and a TV”. A far cry from what other inmates receive, prosecutors further asserted her conditions in prison “set her far apart from general population inmates”.
Per the Bureau of Prisons’s inmate handbook for those incarcerated at the MDC, a typical inmate’s day looks very different from how prosecutors described Ghislaine Maxwell’s life behind bars now. Inmates are typically given a strict regimen with working & sanitation orders. Items like TVs can only be watched “after working hours” – per the manual, inmates may have “up to one radio or mp3 player at a time”.
Inmates in gen pop also don’t have a private shower – per the inmate handbook, they have to adhere to a shower schedule and share those facilities with other inmates. Granted, Ghislaine Maxwell is still reportedly in solitary confinement. However, we doubt typical inmates in solitary are let out of their cells “thirteen hours a day”.
Flight risk
Prosecutors are maintaining that due to her millions in net worth and her citizenship to three countries – including France, a country that doesn’t extradite its nationals – Ghislaine Maxwell remains a serious flight risk and should be denied bail. Again.
“Nothing in the renewed bail application alters the analysis that led this court to conclude that the defendant ‘poses a substantial actual risk of flight,’ and that no combination of conditions could assure her appearance,” prosecutors argued Friday, saying Ghislaine Maxwell’s proposed $28 million dollar bail package still wasn’t enough to convince them she’d stay in the States to stand trial.
On July 14, prosecutors argued against bail for the first time, arguing successfully that Ghislaine Maxwell’s charges were serious and Maxwell herself was a flight risk due to her net worth, connections, and multiple passports.
The $22 million package
Ghislaine Maxwell maintains her innocence and maintains she isn’t a flight risk. At her first bail hearing in July, her attorneys argued she would have surrendered voluntarily had she been given a chance. Plus, the reason she couldn’t articulate her financial plans to stay in New York – she reportedly planned to stay in a luxury hotel – was due to conditions in jail.
This time, per Reuters, Ghislaine Maxwell’s bail package included a stay at a residence in New York under 24-hour guard to ensure she doesn’t flee and remains safe from would-be attackers.
Her new bail package jumped in cost from the previous $5 million bail package to reflect her & now husband’s wealth. Although her husband’s name was redacted from court papers, last week, he was revealed to be tech CEO Scott Borgerson.
Hearing the case again
Per Reuters, Judge Alison Nathan will hear the new bail proposal, although she denied the previous bail petition in July. A date hasn’t been set in stone. Ghislaine Maxwell will stand trial in July 2021 and can face up to thirty-five years in prison if convicted.
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Do you think Ghislaine Maxwell will get bail now? Let us know in the comments!
