🔗 Share this article Federal Judge Rules DOJ May Make Public Maxwell Court Documents A U.S. judge has ruled that the Department of Justice can proceed with the public release of investigative materials from the sex trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the close associate of Jeffrey Epstein. Judicial Ruling Paves the Way for Records Release Judge Paul A. Engelmayer issued the ruling after the DOJ formally requested in November to make public grand jury transcripts and evidence from the cases of both Maxwell and Epstein. This request could lead to the release of hundreds or thousands of hitherto sealed documents. The court's ruling, which follows the recent passage of the Transparency Act, means these records could be released within a 10-day period. The new law requires the Justice Department to provide Epstein-related records in a digitally searchable form by a specified date in December. Growing Trend of Disclosure Engelmayer is the latest jurist to permit the DOJ to publicly disclose once-confidential records from the Epstein case. Recently, a judge in Florida approved a comparable petition to release transcripts from an earlier federal probe into Epstein from the 2000s. A separate request concerning records from Epstein's 2019 sex-trafficking case is still under consideration. Scope of Release Greatly Expanded The Justice Department has stated that the U.S. Congress aimed for this disclosure when it passed the Transparency Act. The most recent filing dramatically enlarged 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 Notes from victim interviews Data from digital devices Material from earlier Epstein investigations 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 convicted 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 will edit records to safeguard victim anonymity and prevent the dissemination of explicit imagery. Previous Disclosures A significant number of pages of documents related to Epstein and Maxwell have already been released through different channels, including lawsuits, official releases, and Freedom of Information Act requests. Much of the evidence the DOJ now plans to release stems from reports, photographs, videos collected by police in Florida and the local U.S. attorney’s office, both of which looked into Epstein in the mid-2000s. That investigation concluded in 2008 with a then-secret arrangement that allowed Epstein to avoid federal prosecution by pleading guilty to a state prostitution charge. He served 13 months in a work-release program.