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A federal judge has determined that the Justice Department is authorized to carry out the public release of investigative materials from the sex-trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the longtime confidant of Jeffrey Epstein.

Court Order Paves the Way for Document Disclosure

Judge Paul A. Engelmayer made the decision after the Justice Department asked the court in November to make public grand jury transcripts and evidence from the cases of Epstein and Maxwell. This action could lead to the publication of a vast number of previously unreleased documents.

The court's ruling, which follows the recent enactment of the Transparency Act, means these materials could be made public within a 10-day window. The legislation requires the DOJ to provide pertaining to Epstein records in a digitally searchable form by December 19.

Growing Trend of Unsealing

Engelmayer is the latest jurist to permit the DOJ to release previously secret records from the Epstein case. Recently, a judge in Florida granted a comparable petition to release transcripts from an earlier federal probe into Epstein from the early 2000s.

A further petition concerning records from Epstein's 2019 sex-trafficking case remains pending.

Breadth of Disclosure Significantly Enlarged

The DOJ has stated that the U.S. Congress aimed for 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 sex-trafficking investigation.

These materials are reported to include items such as:

• Search warrants
• Financial records
• Notes from victim interviews
• Data from digital devices
• Evidence from prior probes in Florida

Case Background

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

The government has indicated it is conferring with survivors and their lawyers and will edit records to protect survivors' identities and stop the sharing of explicit imagery.

Previous Disclosures

Tens of thousands of pages of documents pertaining to Epstein and Maxwell have already been released through different channels, including lawsuits, official releases, and Freedom of Information Act requests.

Much of the evidence the DOJ now intends to disclose originates from photos, videos, and reports gathered by police in Florida and the local U.S. attorney’s office, 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 completed 13 months in a work-release program.