Due to the “horrific scheme” that caused “incalculable” suffering to victims, Ghislaine Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years in jail on Tuesday for aiding sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein in abusing teenage girls.
The 60 years old British socialite was found guilty in December of five counts, including trafficking in minors for sex, for grooming four girls between 1994 and 2004 to have sex with Epstein, who was then her boyfriend.
Ghislaine Maxwell’s month-long trial in late 2021 was widely regarded as the reckoning Epstein never had.
Maxwell’s attorneys had requested that she serve no longer than 5-1/4 years, claiming that she was being used as a scapegoat for Epstein’s misdeeds.
The 20-year sentence would hold Ghislaine Maxwell accountable for her “heinous crimes against children,” according to prosecutors, who had last week recommended she serve between 30 and 55 years in prison.
Epstein died in August 2019 at the age of 66 while facing charges in a federal prison in Manhattan. Authorities claimed that it was suicide.
For years, Maxwell and Epstein socialized with well-known and wealthy individuals such as former Presidents Donald Trump and Bill Clinton, Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, and Prince Andrew of Britain.
In July 2020, the British socialite was arrested in New Hampshire, a year after Epstein was arrested on child sex trafficking charges.
Other than Epstein, she is the first person charged in connection with his alleged sexual abuse of underage girls.
The accusers were teenagers when Epstein allegedly abused them at his properties in the United States and London.
The majority of the actions that gave rise to the allegations took place in the 1990s.
