Ghislaine Maxwell has alleged that the Justice Department shielded 29 associates of Jeffrey Epstein by covering them under undisclosed, behind-the-scenes deals. The disgraced socialite submitted a habeas corpus petition on December 17 in an effort to have her conviction overturned, claiming prosecutors struck arrangements with Epstein's associates while treating her case as though no such deals were in place.
Maxwell alleges that 25 men secretly reached undisclosed deals with authorities, while four other alleged co-conspirators were identified by investigators but never charged. She does not identify any of them by name. "None of the four named co-conspirators or the 25 men with secret settlements were indicted," the court filing says.
All Those Who Escaped
Maxwell claims that hiding these alleged agreements compromised the integrity of her trial and infringed on her constitutional rights. "New evidence reveals that there were 25 men with which the plaintiff lawyers reached secret settlements - that could equally be considered as co-conspirators," the legal document states.
"None of these men have been prosecuted and none has been revealed to Petitioner; she would have called them as witnesses had she known."
In the lengthy court filing, Maxwell lays out several arguments in support of her habeas petition, claiming her trial was flawed by issues such as juror misconduct and prosecutors' withholding of evidence.
Maxwell claims prosecutors broke the terms of Epstein's 2007 Florida non-prosecution deal, which she says also protected alleged co-conspirators. She argues she was singled out and prosecuted for political reasons while others avoided accountability.
Now 64, Maxwell is serving a 20-year sentence at a minimum-security federal women's prison in Bryan, Texas. She was convicted in New York in December 2021 for sex trafficking, tied to her role in recruiting and grooming underage girls for Epstein between 1994 and 2004.
No Respite for Maxwell
Meanwhile, the Justice Department has said it expects to make the Epstein files public in the near future. Attorney General Pam Bondi noted that lawyers are currently reviewing and heavily redacting millions of pages from DOJ, FBI, and U.S. attorneys' office records.
A law passed in November required those files to be released by December 19, triggering a massive review effort involving around 200 prosecutors in the Southern District of New York — including attorneys pulled from other major cases to help handle the workload.
The delay has set off a backlash on Capitol Hill. Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California slammed the Justice Department, calling the hold-up a "blatant violation" of the law.
The two lawmakers wrote to Judge Paul Engelmayer, who presided over Maxwell's New York trial, asking him to appoint an independent overseer to make sure the DOJ follows through. Engelmayer rejected the request last week, saying he doesn't have the power to oversee the Justice Department's actions.
He also said he had received letters from Epstein's victims backing the lawmakers' request.
The judge pointed out that Massie and Khanna still have options, such as filing a separate lawsuit or using Congress's own powers to press for oversight of the Justice Department.
The Supreme Court declined to take up Maxwell's appeal last year, leaving her conviction untouched. With her appeals exhausted, she has now turned to what legal experts call an "extraordinary" last-resort move — a habeas corpus petition filed in New York — asking the court to throw out or revise her sentence over alleged constitutional violations.
Such petitions are rare and difficult to win, typically allowed only after all appeals fail and usually requiring new evidence or proof of serious legal errors. They succeed only in the most unusual cases.
