The fall of Ghislaine Maxwell is something to behold.

The daughter of newspaper magnate Robert Maxwell, Ghislaine was educated at Oxford and became a prominent socialite. Now, as a result of her relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, she is on trial in Manhattan for sex trafficking.

Despite the proceedings taking place in New York I think there are a number of aspects to the trial that are worthy of attention for an audience in the UK who are interested in legal affairs.

Tactics of the Prosecution

The prosecution will be seeking to portray Maxwell in the worst possible light and that will focus on how central she was to the sexual offences committed by Epstein.

Lara Pomerantz is the Assistant U.S. Attorney on the case and opened with a very stark statement:

“She was in on it from the start. The defendant and Epstein lured their victims with a promise of a bright future, only to sexually exploit them…”

The trafficking scheme lasted for more than a decade and prosecutors will try to prove that the defendant was at the heart of things throughout this period. While Maxwell and Epstein were not romantically involved throughout that time, the pair remained close and Maxwell has been described as both a close friend-come-personal assistant. The prosecution allege that she essentially normalised the abuse by taking the victims on shopping trips, talking to them about their lives and demonstrating how they should ‘massage’ Mr. Epstein.

Tactics of the Defence

I think that the tactics of the defence in this case will offer a lot for legal academics and lawyers here in the UK to ponder. In cases like this where there are allegations of sexual abuse against children there is a temptation for defence lawyers to blame the victim as much as defend their own client. The tide is turning against that approach as society comes to the (long overdue) conclusion that it is wrong to blame vulnerable victims but Maxwell’s lawyers don’t seem to have got the memo. Bobbi Sternheim said that “accusers have shaken the money tree, and millions of dollars have fallen their way.” It was suggested that the victims were proceeding under memories that were a quarter-of-a-century old at this point as well as the influence of lawyers who had their eyes set on a fund for victims set up by the Epstein estate after his passing in 2019.

As for Maxwell herself, while the prosecution paint her out to be an accomplice, her defence team will try to portray her as Epstein’s puppet within a much larger sexual abuse scheme. Now that Epstein is dead, prosecutors are out for blood and Maxwell is simply the most obvious target however she is merely a scapegoat for the powerful men who actually perpetrated the abuse.

The Prince Andrew Connection

One of those powerful men is the Duke of York, Prince Andrew. Maxwell and Andrew were friends long before the prince met Epstein. In fact it was Maxwell who originally introduced the two men.

Epstein’s pilot has already testified that Andrew was on board the financier’s private plane and as the trial proceeds it seems likely that the close connection between the two Brits could reveal some more unsavoury details about the disgraced royal.