OR years she was the dar -
ling of the Manhattan
party circuit, swanning
about in the champagne-
fuelled stratosphere of
billionaires, royalty, poli-
ticians and celebrities.
But there was a darker
tothe social butterfly’s world –
today Ghislaine Maxwell finds
elfat the centre of a case that’s
pedthe globe and laid bare the
under belly of New York’s rich and
ous.
e 57-year-old socialite has plenty
questions to answer after the
athof her one-time boyfriend and
onfidant Jeffrey Epstein (66), the
disgraced financier found hanged
nhis New York jail cell while
awaiting trial on sex-trafficking
charges (YOU, 22 August).
As his alleged victims clamour
forjustice, Ghislaine has been
ccused of being the “madam”
whorecruited underage girls for
e convicted sex offender.
most damning allegations are
nedin court documents unsealed
y that relate to a civil case one of
n’smost vocal accusers, Virginia
filed against Ghislaine in 2015.
niaclaims Ghislaine recruited her
hewas working as a changing-
ssistant at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club in Florida, not far from
Epstein’s Palm Beach home.
Aged just 15, she was trained to give
Epstein erotic massages. She was also
farmed out to other men.
“My whole life revolved around just
pleasing these men and keeping Ghis-
laine and Jeffrey happy,” Virginia said.
“Their lives revolved around sex. They call
massages sex. They call modelling sex.”
Virginia’s dad, Sky Roberts, who also
worked at Mar-a-Lago, is furious that
Ghislaine hasn’t been brought to book.
“She’s really to blame too,” he told the
UK’s Daily Mail. “She was the only one
who came to the club and met these
young girls. The authorities need to hunt
her down.
“Maxwell knows it all. She’s the key to
finding everything out.
“Those who know her say it’s possible
she’s as much of a Houdini as Epstein,”
Vanity Fair reports. “Both of them liked
having secrets, and the way those secrets
kept people off balance.”I
T WAS the death of another powerful
man – her father – that propelled Ghis-
laine into the rarefied world of Ep-
stein’s New York.
Oxford-educated Ghislaine was the
ninth child of media mogul Robert
Maxwell and his wife, Betty. She was her
father’s favourite child and the namesake
of his superyacht, Lady Ghislaine.EpsteinandMaxwellwere
loversfora whilethenbe-
ffrey Epstein’s close friend Ghislaine
axwell stands accused of acting as ‘madam’
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