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A federal judge has determined that the Justice Department is authorized to carry out the disclosure of case files from the sex-trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the longtime confidant of Jeffrey Epstein.

Judicial Ruling Paves the Way for Records Release

Judge Paul A. Engelmayer made the decision after the DOJ asked the court in November to make public grand jury transcripts and evidence from the cases of both Maxwell and Epstein. This request could lead to the publication of hundreds or thousands of previously unreleased documents.

The court's ruling, which comes in the wake of the recent passage of the Transparency Act, means these records could be made public within a 10-day period. The new law requires the DOJ to provide Epstein-related records in a searchable format by December 19.

Judicial Pattern of Disclosure

Engelmayer is the latest jurist to allow the DOJ to publicly disclose once-confidential records from the Epstein case. Recently, a Florida judge approved a comparable petition to release transcripts from an abandoned federal grand jury investigation into Epstein from the early 2000s.

A separate request concerning records from Epstein's 2019 sex-trafficking case remains pending.

Breadth of Disclosure Greatly Expanded

The Justice Department has stated that the U.S. Congress intended this disclosure when it enacted the Transparency Act. The most recent filing dramatically enlarged the scope of files slated for release to include 18 categories of investigative materials during the wide-ranging probe.

These materials are reported to include items such as:

• Search warrants
• Banking documents
• Notes from victim interviews
• Data from digital devices
• Evidence from prior probes in Florida

Case Background

Jeffrey Epstein, a wealthy financier, was taken into custody in July 2019 on federal charges. He was found dead in a federal jail cell a month later, with his death officially deemed a suicide. Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted of related charges in December 2021 and is currently serving a two-decade sentence.

The federal authorities has indicated it is consulting survivors and their lawyers and will edit records to protect survivors' identities and prevent the dissemination of sensitive imagery.

Prior Releases

A significant number of pages of documents related to Epstein and Maxwell have already been released through different channels, including civil cases, official releases, and Freedom of Information Act requests.

Much of the evidence the Justice Department now plans to release originates from photos, videos, and reports collected by police in Palm Beach, Florida and the local U.S. attorney’s office, both of which looked into Epstein in the mid-2000s.

That investigation ended in 2008 with a confidential deal that enabled Epstein to evade federal charges by entering a guilty plea to a state prostitution charge. He served 13 months in a jail work-release program.