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A federal judge has ruled that the Department of Justice can proceed with the disclosure of case files from the sex-trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the close associate 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 unseal grand jury transcripts and exhibits from the cases of both Maxwell and Epstein. This action could lead to the release of a vast number of hitherto sealed documents.

The court's ruling, which follows the recent enactment of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, means these materials could be made public within a 10-day window. The new law mandates the Justice Department to provide Epstein-related records in a searchable format by a specified date in December.

Judicial Pattern of Unsealing

Engelmayer is the latest jurist to allow the DOJ to publicly disclose once-confidential Epstein court records. Recently, a judge in Florida approved a comparable petition to release transcripts from an earlier federal probe into Epstein from the early 2000s.

A separate request concerning records from Epstein's 2019 sex-trafficking case remains pending.

Scope of Release Greatly Expanded

The DOJ has stated that Congress intended this disclosure when it enacted the Transparency Act. The most recent filing dramatically enlarged the scope 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
• Banking documents
• Survivor interview notes
• Electronic device data
• Evidence from earlier Epstein investigations 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 ruled a suicide. Ghislaine Maxwell was found guilty of sex-trafficking charges in December 2021 and is currently serving a 20-year prison sentence.

The federal authorities has indicated it is conferring with survivors and their lawyers and plans to redact records to protect survivors' identities and stop the sharing of sensitive imagery.

Prior Releases

Tens of thousands of pages of records related to Epstein and Maxwell have already been released through different channels, including lawsuits, public disclosures, and Freedom of Information Act requests.

Much of the evidence the DOJ now intends to disclose originates from reports, photographs, videos collected by police in Florida and the local U.S. attorney’s office, both of which investigated Epstein in the mid-2000s.

That federal probe ended in 2008 with a confidential deal that enabled Epstein to evade federal charges by pleading guilty to a state prostitution charge. He served over a year in a work-release program.