The U.S. Supreme Court should hear Ghislaine Maxwell’s appeal of her 2021 sex trafficking conviction because the government has an “obligation to honor” a non-prosecution agreement with Jeffrey Epstein that inoculated Maxwell from any criminal charges, her lawyers argued in a brief to the Supreme Court Monday.
“Plea and non-prosecution agreements resolve nearly every federal case. They routinely include promises that extend to others—co-conspirators, family members, potential witnesses. If those promises mean different things in different parts of the country, then trust in our system collapses,” the brief said.
Federal prosecutors have argued that the non-prosecution agreement applied only in Florida and did not bind New York, where charges against him, and subsequently Maxwell, were brought.
Maxwell’s attorneys argued the terms of the NPA Epstein signed were unqualified.
“It is not geographically limited to the Southern District of Florida, it is not conditioned on the co-conspirators being known by the government at the time, it does not depend on what any particular government attorney may have had in his or her head about who might be a co-conspirator, and it contains no other caveat or exception. This should be the end of the discussion,” the defense brief said.
Ghislaine Maxwell attends Polo Ralph Lauren host Victories of Athlete Ally at Polo Ralph Lauren Store on November 3, 2015 in New York City.
Jared Siskin/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images
The Justice Department has urged the Supreme Court to reject Maxwell’s petition even as Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche agreed to meet with Maxwell last week.
Prosecutors have argued Maxwell cannot enforce the NPA because she was not a party to it. The defense disagreed.
“Petitioner’s alleged status as Epstein’s co-conspirator was the entire basis of her prosecution,” the defense brief said.
“No one is above the law—not even the Southern District of New York. Our government made a deal, and it must honor it. The United States cannot promise immunity with one hand in Florida and prosecute with the other in New York. President Trump built his legacy in part on the power of a deal—and surely he would agree that when the United States gives its word, it must stand by it. We are appealing not only to the Supreme Court but to the President himself to recognize how profoundly unjust it is to scapegoat Ghislaine Maxwell for Epstein’s crimes, especially when the government promised she would not be prosecuted,” Maxwell’s attorney David Oscar Markus said in a statement.
The Supreme Court in Washington, Oct. 9, 2018.
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
