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A federal judge has determined that the Justice Department can proceed with the disclosure of investigative materials 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 issued the ruling after the Justice Department formally requested in November to make public grand jury transcripts and exhibits from the cases of Epstein and Maxwell. This request could lead to the publication of hundreds or thousands of hitherto sealed documents.

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

Judicial Pattern of Disclosure

Engelmayer is the second judge to permit the Justice Department to release once-confidential records from the Epstein case. Recently, a judge in Florida granted a similar request to unseal records from an earlier federal probe into Epstein from the early 2000s.

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

Breadth of Disclosure Greatly Expanded

The Justice Department has stated that Congress intended this unsealing when it enacted the Transparency Act. The most recent filing vastly expanded the range of files slated for release to include eighteen distinct types of evidence gathered during the wide-ranging probe.

These documents are reported to include items such as:

• Court-issued warrants
• Financial records
• Survivor interview notes
• Data from digital devices
• Material from prior probes in Florida

Context of the Cases

Jeffrey Epstein, a wealthy financier, was arrested in July 2019 on federal charges. He was found dead in a federal jail cell a month later, with his death ruled a suicide. Ghislaine Maxwell was convicted of sex-trafficking charges in December 2021 and is serving a two-decade sentence.

The federal authorities has indicated it is consulting victims and their attorneys and will edit records to protect survivors' identities and stop the sharing of explicit imagery.

Prior Releases

Tens of thousands of pages of records pertaining to Epstein and Maxwell have previously been made public through various means, including lawsuits, public disclosures, and Freedom of Information Act requests.

Much of the evidence the DOJ now plans to release stems from reports, photographs, videos gathered by police in Palm Beach, Florida and the federal prosecutor's office there, both of which looked into Epstein in the mid-2000s.

That federal probe ended in 2008 with a then-secret arrangement that allowed Epstein to avoid federal charges by pleading guilty to a state charge. He served over a year in a work-release program.