Topline
Grand jury documents in Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell’s cases only include interviews with law enforcement and do not include any testimony from Epstein’s victims directly, the Justice Department confirmed in a filing late Tuesday, further suggesting the grand jury materials may not include any explosive details the public wants as the Trump administration pushes to release them instead of the FBI’s full Epstein files.
Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell at Cipriani Wall Street on March 15, 2005 in New York City.
The Trump administration is asking multiple courts to unseal grand jury documents in the prosecutions against Epstein and Maxwell, which would detail what the grand juries were told in order to decide the defendants should be indicted.
The DOJ submitted a court filing late Tuesday further laying out its case for why the grand jury materials should be released, as federal law only allows those documents to be unsealed under very limited circumstances.
As part of their filing, prosecutors noted the only witness to testify to the grand jury in Epstein’s case was an FBI agent, while Maxwell’s grand jury included testimony from the same FBI agent and a NYPD detective who had been a Task Force Officer with the FBI’s Child Exploitation and Human Trafficking Task Force.
That means jurors did not hear from any of Epstein’s victims themselves during the grand jury proceedings, and any grand jury transcripts would likely only include law enforcement testifying about evidence in the case, rather than that evidence directly.
Trump asked the DOJ to unseal grand jury materials amid the broader outcry over the agency’s memo saying it would not release any more of its own Epstein files, but the filing Tuesday confirms speculation the grand jury files are much more limited than the thousands of documents the government has in its possession.
It remains to be seen whether any courts will allow the grand jury materials to be released, though a judge in one of the cases has already ruled against unsealing them.
Federal law requires grand jury materials to remain secret unless the request to disclose them fits into any of a few narrow categories, such as if the grand jury information connects to a different judicial proceeding, if a defendant believes the grand jury materials could help get their indictment dismissed, if a foreign court or prosecutor needs the matters for an “official criminal investigation,” or if the information could disclose a violation of state, tribal, military or foreign law. The Trump administration argued Tuesday the documents should be released because courts have previously found grand jury materials can be released under “special circumstances” outside of the law’s narrow limits, however. In this case, the “abundant public interest” in Epstein and Maxwell’s crimes and law enforcements’ “investigative work” justifies the materials’ release, the government argued, claiming its aim is to “provide information to the public while remaining sensitive to protecting the rights of victims.” It remains to be seen if judges will be persuaded by that argument, and Maxwell still hasn’t issued a response to the government’s request in her case, as she may oppose the files being released.
It won’t be clear what the materials say until they get fully released, and the DOJ’s filings to the courts specifying which documents it specifically wants to unseal have not been made public. The government has also said it will redact any identifying information about victims and others mentioned in the transcripts, and told the court Tuesday that “many of the victims” whose accounts were presented to the grand jury also testified at Maxwell’s trial. That means it’s unclear how much of the testimony given to the grand jury could be new to the public. Epstein and Maxwell were indicted on sex trafficking charges alleging they sexually abused and trafficked women, including minors, so any testimony to the grand jury would focus on those allegations. The indictment against Epstein alleges employees and unnamed “associates” of his were involved in the alleged sex trafficking operation, but it does not make any allegations about the financier’s powerful friends participating in it, or suggest the grand jury would have known the identity of other people who abused women thanks to Epstein.
Epstein was indicted in 2019 on sex trafficking charges, as the financier allegedly abused more than 100 women before dying in prison in 2019. Maxwell is believed to be Epstein’s closest associate, and was indicted in 2020 on charges alleging she helped recruit women for Epstein and took part in his alleged abuse. She was later convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison, though she’s still appealing her case. Interest in the Epstein and Maxwell cases has surged in the wake of the DOJ’s July memo disclosing it would not release any further documents, which came after Trump officials had long promised the Epstein files would be released. That sparked an outcry from the right and calls for Attorney General Pam Bondi to resign. While the government has not given into the pressure to release the full Epstein files, the request for the grand jury materials is one of a few more limited steps the DOJ has taken to try and appease the public. Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche also interviewed Maxwell last week about Epstein’s associates, with Maxwell’s attorney saying she answered questions about “maybe about 100 people” and did not refuse to answer any questions. It still remains unclear if any information from her testimony will be publicly released, however, with Blanche only saying last week the DOJ “will share additional information about what we learned at the appropriate time.”