£21.2m bail package for Maxwell is rejected by US judge

A JUDGE has rejected a £21.2 million proposed bail package for Jeffrey Epstein’s former girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell.

US District Judge Alison J Nathan said Maxwell’s imprisonment is necessary to ensure she faces trial on charges she recruited teenage girls for Epstein to sexually abuse. Ms Nathan did not immediately release an opinion explaining her reasoning, to allow defence lawyers and prosecutors to propose redactions.

Oxford University-educated Maxwell, 59, was arrested in early July and her first attempt at bail shortly afterwards was also rejected.

She has remained at a federal jail in Brooklyn, New York, since Judge Nathan said there were no bail conditions that would ensure she would not flee.

Maxwell’s lawyers recently offered the new bail package, saying she and her husband were offering all of their wealth – £16.7 million – and the assets of friends and family to secure bail. Maxwell’s husband has not been publicly identified. Her lawyers said she would remain in a New York

City residence and would submit to electronic monitoring if the judge accepted the bail package.

Prosecutors said Maxwell was a high risk to flee because, in addition to US citizenship, she holds citizenship in the UK and France.

Epstein killed himself in August, 2019, at a Manhattan federal prison as he awaited a sex trafficking trial.