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A U.S. judge has ruled that the Department of Justice is authorized to carry out the disclosure of case files from the sex-trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the longtime confidant of Jeffrey Epstein.

Court Order Paves the Way for Records Release

Judge Paul A. Engelmayer made the decision after the Justice Department asked the court in November to make public grand jury records and exhibits from the cases of both Maxwell and Epstein. This request could lead to the release of hundreds or thousands of previously unreleased documents.

The court's ruling, which comes in the wake of the recent enactment of the Transparency Act, means these records could be released within a 10-day period. The new law requires the Justice Department to provide pertaining to Epstein records in a searchable format by a specified date in December.

Judicial Pattern of Disclosure

Engelmayer is the second judge to allow the Justice Department to release previously secret Epstein court records. Recently, a judge in Florida granted a similar request to unseal records from an earlier federal probe into Epstein from the 2000s.

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

Scope of Release Significantly Enlarged

The Justice Department has stated that Congress aimed for this disclosure 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 wide-ranging sex-trafficking investigation.

These materials are reported to include items such as:

• Court-issued warrants
• Financial records
• Survivor interview notes
• Electronic device data
• Material from earlier Epstein investigations in Florida

Context of the Cases

Jeffrey Epstein, a wealthy financier, was arrested in July 2019 on sex trafficking charges. He was found dead in a prison cell a month later, with his death ruled a suicide. Ghislaine Maxwell was found guilty 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 prevent the dissemination of sensitive 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, official releases, and FOIA requests.

Much of the material the DOJ now plans to release stems from reports, photographs, videos gathered by police in Florida and the local U.S. attorney’s office, both of which investigated Epstein in the mid-2000s.

That investigation concluded in 2008 with a confidential deal that allowed Epstein to avoid federal charges by entering a guilty plea to a state charge. He completed 13 months in a jail work-release program.