Opening arguments in the trial of Ghislaine Maxwell Clue to the battles for blame and future wealth

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Is it about the woman? a passerby asked of the rows of film crews gathered outside a Manhattan courthouse early Monday morning.

A line to enter the building had stretched out in the street, a roundabout answering the question. Yes, it was the woman, Ghislaine Maxwell, who, just over two years after Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide while awaiting trial in a nearby federal prison, was finally on trial for her alleged role in the decades. financial sexual predation.

Maxwell has pleaded not guilty to all charges she faces, including charges related to child sex trafficking. Prosecutors say she prepared girls for Epstein’s abuse and sometimes participated in it herself. Reporters and observers showed up in four courtrooms, one for the trial itself, three more to accommodate media interest in the case to watch the start of efforts to unravel Maxwell’s relationship with Epstein.

In the afternoon, once a jury for the trial was selected, Maxwell, dressed in a white turtleneck, appeared animated as she whispered to her lawyers across a conference table. Assistant U.S. Attorney Lara Pomerantz made the government’s opening argument by starting with one of the stories of alleged victims.

I want to tell you about a young girl named Jane, said Pomerantz. Prosecutors say Maxwell and Epstein met Jane when she was 14 at summer camp. What Jane didn’t know then, Pomerantz continued, was that this summer camp reunion was the start of a nightmare that would last for years.

The prosecution case revolves around four of Epstein’s alleged victims. Maxwell sexually abused them, Pomerantz said, saying Maxwell made them feel safe around her in order to prepare them for Epstein’s abuse. They made these girls feel seen, Pomerantz said. They made them feel special.

Pomerantz has often referred to Maxwell’s jet set, claiming that Maxwell recruited the girls as a way to stay close to Epstein and his wealth. These girls were just a way to support his lifestyle, Pomerantz said. In concluding her remarks, she appeared to be trying to cope with an argument the defense is supposed to make about the motives of victims who have received settlements from the Epstein Victims Compensation Fund.

These witnesses would have paid anything to have this not happen to them, Pomerantz said. They would pay anything to never have met the accused and Epstein.

Bobbi Sternheim, Maxwell’s lead lawyer, would indeed continue to question the motives of the victims, but before that, at the start of her roughly hour-long remarks, she zoomed in as far as narratively as possible.

Ever since Eve tempted Adam with the apple, Sternheim said opening his statement, women have been blamed for men’s bad behavior.

The defense case, as described by Sternheim, centers on the payments the victims received and the idea that their memories would have been tainted by time and Epstein’s greatest spectacle. It’s not visible, Sternheim said, but it consumes this entire courtroom and is overflowing with courtrooms.

At one point, Sternheim began to describe Maxwell as a scapegoat before the prosecution objected three times in a row. Justice Alison Nathan had ruled at a pre-trial conference that arguments regarding the government’s motives for pursuing the Maxwell case were inadmissible. After Sternheim and the four prosecutors spoke to Nathan, Sternheim returned to a perhaps narrower version of the scapegoat argument: four women will enter this courtroom and they will point fingers at Ghislaine Maxwell.

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