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A federal judge has ruled 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 Clears the Path for Records Release

Judge Paul A. Engelmayer made the decision after the Justice Department asked the court in November to unseal grand jury transcripts and exhibits from the cases of both Maxwell and Epstein. This request could lead to the publication of a vast number of hitherto sealed documents.

The judge's decision, which comes in the wake of the recent passage of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, means these records could be made public within a 10-day period. The legislation requires the DOJ to provide pertaining to Epstein records in a digitally searchable form by a specified date in December.

Judicial Pattern of Unsealing

Engelmayer is the latest jurist to allow the DOJ to release once-confidential records from the Epstein case. Recently, a Florida judge granted a similar request to unseal records from an abandoned federal grand jury investigation into Epstein from the 2000s.

A separate request concerning records from Epstein's 2019 criminal case is still under consideration.

Breadth of Disclosure Greatly Expanded

The DOJ has stated that Congress intended this unsealing when it enacted the Transparency Act. The latest request vastly expanded the scope of files slated for release to include eighteen distinct types of investigative materials during the extensive sex-trafficking investigation.

These materials are reported to include items such as:

• Search warrants
• Financial records
• Notes from victim interviews
• Electronic device data
• Material from earlier Epstein investigations in Florida

Case Background

Jeffrey Epstein, a financier, was taken into custody in July 2019 on sex trafficking charges. He was found dead in a prison 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 20-year prison sentence.

The government has indicated it is conferring with survivors and their lawyers and plans to redact records to protect survivors' identities and stop the sharing of explicit imagery.

Prior Releases

Tens of thousands of pages of documents pertaining to Epstein and Maxwell have previously been made public through various means, including civil cases, official releases, and Freedom of Information Act requests.

Much of the material the DOJ now plans to release originates from photos, videos, and reports gathered 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 concluded in 2008 with a then-secret arrangement that allowed Epstein to avoid federal prosecution by pleading guilty to a state charge. He completed over a year in a jail work-release program.