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A U.S. judge has determined 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 Clears the Path for Records Release

Judge Paul A. Engelmayer made the decision after the DOJ asked the court in November to unseal grand jury transcripts and exhibits from the cases of Epstein and Maxwell. This action 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 made public within a 10-day window. The legislation mandates the Justice Department to provide Epstein-related records in a digitally searchable form by a specified date in December.

Growing Trend of Unsealing

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 abandoned federal grand jury investigation into Epstein from the 2000s.

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

Breadth of Disclosure Significantly Enlarged

The DOJ has stated that Congress intended this disclosure when it passed the Transparency Act. The most recent filing vastly expanded the range of files slated for release to include 18 categories of investigative materials during the wide-ranging probe.

These materials are reported to include items such as:

• Search warrants
• Banking documents
• Survivor interview notes
• Electronic device data
• Evidence from prior probes in Florida

Case Background

Jeffrey Epstein, a wealthy financier, was taken into custody in July 2019 on federal charges. He was discovered deceased in a federal jail 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 two-decade sentence.

The government has indicated it is consulting survivors and their lawyers and plans to redact records to safeguard victim anonymity and stop the sharing of explicit imagery.

Previous Disclosures

A significant number of pages of documents pertaining to Epstein and Maxwell have previously been made public through different channels, including lawsuits, public disclosures, and FOIA requests.

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

That investigation concluded in 2008 with a confidential deal that allowed Epstein to avoid federal prosecution by pleading guilty to a state charge. He served over a year in a work-release program.