What has Ghislaine Maxwell said about the Jeffrey Epstein scandal?
Jeremy Kyle interviewed the fallen socialite in Ghislaine Behind Bars, after she was jailed for 20 years for grooming
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Your support makes all the difference.Even from behind bars, Ghislaine Maxwell has once again been making headlines.
The 61-year-old socialite was sentenced to 20 years in prison last year, for grooming and recruiting young girls for her paedophile friend Jeffrey Epstein.
Now she has given an interview from her prison in Florida, in which she discusses Epstein – found dead in his prison cell in 2019 – and their mutual friend Prince Andrew. During the hour-long programme she claimed Epstein was “murdered” and claims the authorities “let him die”.
But Ghislaine Behind Bars isn’t the first time she has discussed the scandal surrounding the multi-millionaire.
Below we look at some of the statements Maxwell has made about Epstein in recent years.
2015: In an email to her lawyer in 2015 that was subsequently leaked, she commented on the infamous photograph of Prince Andrew and his accuser Virginia Giuffre, in which she also appears.
Contrary to what she would say years later in interviews, she said: “It looks real. I think it is.”
2016: Three years ago Maxwell’s 2016 deposition as part of a defamation case with Epstein accuser Virginia Roberts Guiffre, was unsealed. The documents provided an unprecedented look into Maxwell’s relationship with convicted child sex abuser Epstein.
Among the many revelations in hundreds of pages, Maxwell admitted she made somewhere between $100,000 and $200,000 while in his employ. She said she had a “very wide-ranging job” which focused on hiring staff, adding that a “very small part” of the job was “from time to time to find adult professional massage therapists for Jeffrey.”
However, she denied claims regarding Ms Guiffre. “Just for the record, I have never at any time, at any place, in any moment, ever asked Virginia Roberts or whatever she is called now, to have sex with anybody,” she said.
When asked if she was aware if Epstein had sexual contact with a person when she was 13-years-old, Maxwell said: “I would be very shocked and surprised if that were true.”
June 2022: During her sentencing last summer, Maxwell said the biggest regret of her life was meeting Epstein, a statement she would repeat in the Kyle interview.
Addressing the Manhattan federal court after a series of emotional statements from the pair’s victims, she said: “I empathised deeply with all the victims in this case.
“I realize I have been convicted of assisting Jeffrey Epstein to commit these crimes. My associate with Epstein will permanently stain me. It is the biggest regret of my life that I ever met him.
“I believe Jeffrey Epstein fooled all of those in his orbit. His victims considered him a mentor, friend, lover. Jeffrey Epstein should have stood before you. In 2005. In 2009. And again in 2019. But today it is for me to be sentenced.”
August 2022: Maxwell has challenged the authenticity of the Prince Andrew photo on a number of occasions, years after she is believed to have confirmed it was legitimate in 2015.
Speaking from a Florida prison via video last August, Maxwell said “I don’t believe it’s real for a second.”
“It’s a fake,” she continued. “There’s never been an original and further there is no photograph. I’ve only ever seen a photocopy of it.”
Maxwell repeated the claim in the TalkTV interview on Monday.
October 2022: Maxwell said she felt “so bad” for her “dear friend” Prince Andrew, after the Duke of York faced public disgrace and removal from working royal duties.
Speaking to the Israeli-American documentary filmmaker Daphne Barak, Maxwell said: “I feel so bad for him. I follow what is happening to him.’’
Maxwell was told Andrew’s lawyers had said the pair were never close, to which she appeared “shaken”, as reported by The Sun on Sunday.
“I accept that this friendship could not survive my conviction,” she said. “He is paying such a price for the association. I consider him a dear friend. I care about him.”
January 2023:
Speaking from prison for the Jeremy Kyle show, Maxwell repeated a number of her previous statements.
She said again she wishes she had “never met” the disgraced financier but further claimed he had been killed.
“I believe that he was murdered,” she said. “I was shocked. Then I wondered how it had happened because as far as I was concerned, he was going to… I was sure he was going to appeal. And I was sure he was covered under the non-prosecution agreement.
“But I wasn’t in the indictment. I wasn’t mentioned. I wasn’t even one of the co-conspirators. I honestly wish I had never met him.
She did not apologise to victims during the programme but urged them instead to “ take their disappointment and upset out on the authorities who allowed that [his death] to happen.
“And as I said I hope they have some closure by the judicial process that took place.”