🔗 Share this article Judge Rules Justice Department Can Make Public Maxwell Case Documents A U.S. judge has determined that the Department of Justice is authorized to carry out the public release of case files from the sex trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the close associate of Jeffrey Epstein. Court Order Paves the Way for Document Disclosure Judge Paul A. Engelmayer issued the ruling after the Justice Department formally requested in November to unseal grand jury transcripts and evidence from the cases of Epstein and Maxwell. This request could lead to the publication of hundreds or thousands of previously unreleased documents. The court's ruling, which comes in the wake of the recent enactment of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, means these records could be released within a 10-day period. 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 Disclosure Engelmayer is the second judge to permit the Justice Department to release previously secret records from the Epstein case. Recently, a judge in Florida granted a comparable petition to unseal records 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. Breadth of Disclosure Significantly Enlarged The DOJ has stated that the U.S. Congress intended this disclosure when it passed the Transparency Act. The latest request dramatically enlarged the scope of files slated for release to include 18 categories of investigative materials during the wide-ranging sex-trafficking investigation. These documents are reported to include items such as: Court-issued warrants Banking documents Notes from victim interviews Data from digital devices Material from earlier Epstein investigations in Florida Case Background Jeffrey Epstein, a financier, was taken into custody in July 2019 on federal charges. He was found dead in a federal jail cell a month later, with his death ruled a suicide. Ghislaine Maxwell was found guilty of sex-trafficking charges in December 2021 and is serving a 20-year prison sentence. The government has indicated it is consulting victims and their attorneys and will edit records to protect survivors' identities and prevent the dissemination of explicit imagery. Prior Releases Tens of thousands of pages of records 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 DOJ now plans to release originates from photos, videos, and reports gathered by police in Florida and the federal prosecutor's office there, both of which looked into Epstein in the 2000s. That investigation concluded in 2008 with a then-secret arrangement that enabled Epstein to evade federal prosecution by entering a guilty plea to a state charge. He completed over a year in a work-release program.