Judge rejects Maxwell's bid to overturn conviction

A federal judge on Tuesday rejected Ghislaine Maxwell's latest attempt to overturn her sex trafficking conviction and 20-year prison sentence, dismissing her claims as "meritless" and "frivolous." In a 67-page decision, U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer of the Southern District of New York denied Maxwell's habeas petition, which argued that newly released documents from the Epstein Files Transparency Act and other alleged constitutional violations warranted a new trial.

Maxwell, 64, the longtime associate of the late financier Jeffrey Epstein, was convicted in December 2021 on five felony counts for her role in recruiting and grooming underage girls for Epstein to abuse. She is serving her sentence at a minimum-security prison camp in Bryan, Texas, and is eligible for release in 2037. Her conviction and sentence were previously upheld by a federal appeals court in 2024, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear her appeal in October 2025.

In her petition filed last December, Maxwell, who represented herself, contended that her constitutional rights were violated at trial and sentencing. She argued that information that would have exonerated her was withheld, that false...