Trial set to begin for friend of Epstein

NEW YORK — Ghislaine Maxwell spent the first half of her life with her father, a rags-to-riches billionaire who looted his companies’ pension funds and died mysteriously. She spent the second with another tycoon, Jeffrey Epstein, who died while charged with sexually abusing teens.

After a life of scandal and luxury, Maxwell’s next act will be decided by a U.S. trial.

Starting Monday, prosecutors in New York will argue that Maxwell, 59, abetted Epstein’s crimes with girls as young as 14. A key question for jurors: Was Maxwell an unwitting pawn of Epstein’s manipulations or a knowing opportunist?

Ian Maxwell said his sister is “paying a heavy price, a blood price” to a justice system intent on holding someone responsible for Epstein’s crimes.

Her father, born Jan Ludvik Hoch, was born in what is now southwestern Ukraine. Escaping the Holocaust, he ultimately joined the British Army and transformed himself into Robert Maxwell.

Maxwell built on his military connections to found a publishing empire.

In 1991, Maxwell fell off his yacht — the Lady Ghislaine — and drowned. Investors would discover his wealth was an illusion: He had diverted hundreds of millions of pounds from pension funds to prop up his empire.

Ian Maxwell said his sister’s relationship with Epstein developed after the family advised her to remain in the U.S. because the Maxwell name was tainted in the U.K. She had to forge new friendships in New York, he said.

In 2005, Epstein was arrested in Palm Beach, Fla., accused of hiring multiple underage girls to perform sex acts.

Years of civil litigation followed, in which women accused Epstein and Maxwell of sexual abuse. Prosecutors in New York charged Epstein with sex trafficking in 2019, but he killed himself in jail before trial.

The indictment against Maxwell is based on accusations from four women who say she recruited them to give Epstein massages that progressed into sexual abuse.