NY state prosecutors must charge Ghislaine Maxwell so that Trump’s pardon won’t help her!

The victims deserve justice!!

“A unanimous jury has found Ghislaine Maxwell guilty of one of the worst crimes imaginable: Facilitating and participating in the sexual abuse of children.”

Those were the words of U.S. Attorney Damian Williams in 2021 after his offices in New York successfully prosecuted Maxwell for five felonies in connection with a child sex ring that spanned at least from 1994 to 2004. As prosecutors stated at time of Maxwell’s sentencing, “Epstein could not have committed these crimes without her." And as we heard at her trial, Maxwell not only recruited the children-- she personally had sex with them. Maxwell is at vile as they come—and for that evil she was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Yet Donald Trump is now on what appears to be the verge of providing her with a pardon if she will say Trump was never involved with Epstein and knew nothing about what she and Epstein were up to—despite a huge amount of evidence telling us the exact opposite. In other words, Trump wants Maxwell to lie to help him and in return she will get to leave prison—which will mean no accountability for her role in creating what might be the largest child sex ring in US history. This would undoubtedly further traumatize the victims who suffered unspeakable horrors at her hands.

That is why New York state prosecutors must announce that if Trump provides Maxwell a pardon, they will immediately charge Maxwell for her crimes under New York state law. They should also declare that Maxwell will be taken into immediate custody upon exiting the federal prison and transported to New York where she will be held without bail until her trial given the heinousness of her crimes.

This is not only a legally sound approach--but it’s demanded given the harm Maxwell caused to countless children. First as to double jeopardy—meaning the government can’t prosecute a person twice for the same crimes—that does not apply in this scenario. The U.S. Supreme Court has long ruled—and reaffirmed in 2019—that individuals can be charged by states and the federal government for the same offense. (This is known as the “dual sovereignty” exception to the U.S. Constitution’s double jeopardy clause.)

The only requirement for the state prosecution is that the crime happened within that state so that there is jurisdiction. In the case of Maxwell, numerous crimes took place in New York since children were trafficked and raped at Epstein’s town house in Manhattan.

In fact at Maxwell’s trial in 2021, “Jane” who testified under a pseudonym, told the jury that Maxwell brought her to New York when she was just 14 years old to have sex with Epstein at his Manhattan residence—which happened again when she was 15 and 16. A second accuser who testified under the name “Kate,” explained she was just 17 when Maxwell flew her to New York to have sex with Epstein. That means there is jurisdiction to prosecute Maxwell under New York state law for her crimes. (The NYPD was a big part of the FBI’s investigation in the Maxwell case, so they already have tons of evidence.)

The only other legal issue is the statute of limitations. This also should not be an issue. Under New York law, there is no statute of limitations for the crime of “predatory sexual assault against a child.” This law provides, “A person is guilty of predatory sexual assault against a child when, being eighteen years old or more, he or she commits the crime of rape in the first degree.”

There is also no statute of limitation in New York for “rape in the first degree” of an adult. Under both laws, what must be shown is that the sexual contact occurred “by forcible compulsion” --which has been defined in New York as a “threat, express or implied, which places a person in fear of immediate death or physical injury to himself or herself or another person.”

There is little doubt that the NYPD has already found that Epstein and Maxwell were involved in threatening children and/or adults to remain silent about the sexual attacks. In fact, one victim, Sarah Ransome, stated that Epstein threatened that if she went to the authorities to expose that he was raping her, “I will kill you and I will kill your parents.” She also noted that “Ghislaine was the ringleader…the enforcer.” Given there are more than “one thousand” victims of Epstein’s sex ring that Trump’s own Department of Justice noted in their July 7, 2025 memo, there will be many people who can make the case Maxwell violated these two laws.

Putting aside the law, Trump even refusing to rule out a pardon for Maxwell is beyond the pale of anything he has done. The pain that Maxwell and Epstein caused to countless girls and women is heartbreaking. I can only imagine the anguish they are feeling when Trump on Friday refused to rule out providing Maxwell with a pardon, instead saying, “I’m allowed to do it.”

But then again Trump and Maxwell were very close as countless images of the two together back up. This is the same Trump who stunned people in 2020 when after Maxwell was arrested for her child sex crimes, he declared “I wish her well.” Trump then doubled down on those “well wishes” when challenged a few weeks later by journalist Jonathan Swan--as you can see below.

To truly grasp the evil carried out by Maxwell, I urge people to read the DOJ statement after she was sentenced in 2022. (That is, before Trump has it taken down.) A few excerpts that jump out include, “From at least 1994, up to and including in or about 2004, GHISLAINE MAXWELL assisted, facilitated, and participated in Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse of minor girls by, among other things, helping Epstein to recruit, groom, and ultimately abuse victims known to MAXWELL and Epstein to be under the age of 18. The victims were as young as 14 years old when they were groomed and abused by MAXWELL and Epstein, both of whom knew that their victims were in fact minors.”

The DOJ—as well as the victims’ testimony at her trial—told us how Maxwell befriend these vulnerable children and then “normalized and facilitated sexual abuse for a victim by discussing sexual topics, undressing in front of the victim, being present when the victim was undressed, and encouraging the victim to massage Epstein.” She even took a 14-year-old shopping at Victoria’s Secret to buy sexy underwear. That same 14-year-old was brought by Jeffrey Epstein to Mar-a-Lago in the mid-1990’s to meet Trump--yet he did nothing to stop the child sex ring.

And to be clear, as DOJ proved at court: Maxwell “participated in the sexual abuse of minor victims.” In other words, Maxwell personally had sex with these children. That is the person Trump “wished well.” And if it helps Trump, that is the person Trump will pardon. If he does, I can assure you that a big chunk of Trump’s base will stick with him and right wing media will defend him.

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