Ghislaine Maxwell and her husband offer $28.5million bail package with armed guards
‘The Ghislaine I know is a wonderful, loving person’: Maxwell’s tech CEO husband makes impassioned plea for her to be released from jail by offering $28.5MILLION bail package including armed guards that will follow her 24/7 and $8M in property
- Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyers requested her release from a Brooklyn lock-up in court papers unsealed Monday
- Her huge bail package includes armed guards to protect her in New York City
- Maxwell and her husband Scott Borgerson are offering a $22.5million personal recognizance bond secured by about $8million in property and $500,000 cash
- Lawyers said the $22.5million represents all of Maxwell and Borgerson’s assets
- Borgerson pleaded for his wife’s release in a letter to the court, writing: ‘The person described in the criminal charges is not the person we know’
- ‘I have never witnessed anything inappropriate with Ghislaine; quite the contrary, the Ghislaine I know is a wonderful and loving person,’ he added
- Maxwell is scheduled to face a July trial on charges that she recruited three teenage girls for Jeffrey Epstein to abuse in the mid-1990s
Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyers have asked a judge to free her from jail under an astonishing $28.5million bail package that would include armed guards to protect her 24/7 in her New York City residence as she awaits trial.
The bail arguments on behalf of Maxwell, who is accused of helping recruit young girls into Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged sex trafficking ring, were filed under seal in Manhattan federal court last Tuesday before being released publicly with redactions late Monday.
The lawyers said Maxwell, 58, and her husband Scott Borgerson, with whom she has been living for the past four years, were offering a $22.5million personal recognizance bond secured by about $8million in property and $500,000 in cash.
They said $22.5million represents all of Maxwell and Borgerson’s assets – which were broken down in a chart included in the court papers requesting the staggering bail package that dwarfs other high profile criminals such as Harvey Weinstein.
Borgerson – a 44-year-old tech CEO whose name was redacted in the papers – pleaded for his wife’s release in a letter to the court, writing: ‘The person described in the criminal charges is not the person we know.
‘I have never witnessed anything inappropriate with Ghislaine; quite the contrary, the Ghislaine I know is a wonderful and loving person.’
Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyers are urging a judge to free her from jail under a $28.5million bail package that would include armed guards to protect her 24/7 in her New York City residence as she awaits trial
Maxwell’s husband Scott Borgerson (pictured) submitted a letter to the court pleading for her release, writing: ‘The person described in the criminal charges is not the person we know. ‘I have never witnessed anything inappropriate with Ghislaine; quite the contrary, the Ghislaine I know is a wonderful and loving person’
A redacted version of Borgerson’s letter is shown above
The lawyers said Maxwell and her husband, with whom she has been living for the past four years, were offering a $22.5million personal recognizance bond secured by about $8million in property and $500,000 in cash. They said $22.5million represents all of Maxwell and her spouse’s assets – which were detailed in a chart (pictured) included in the court papers
‘The reporting of Ghislaine over the past year has exploded exponentially. From the time of Epstein’s arrest and death in custody in the summer of 2019 until Ghislaine’s own arrest in July of this year,’ Borgerson, a wealthy former chief executive of shipping data company CargoMetrics, added.
He also described the coverage as ‘frighteningly intense’.
‘There are many examples of violence whose seeds were born in conspiracy theories and the experiences of QAnon, Pizzagate, and the recent Judge Salas attacks are terrifying.’
Last week a representative for Maxwell, Brian Basham, told DailyMail.com that her lawyers wanted to leave Borgerson’s name out of the bail arguments to avoid more attention – even though his identity was widely exposed after her arrest in July.
DailyMail.com was the first to report that Borgerson and Maxwell were an item almost a year earlier – after Epstein was arrested last August.
Borgerson, who is 14 years Maxwell’s junior, left his wife in 2014 and tried to reconcile before finally divorcing her in December 2015.
The court papers confirmed that Borgerson and Maxwell got married in 2016 – marking the first time that they’ve publicly acknowledged the union.
The identities of seven other close friends and family members who the lawyers said were willing to pledge about $5million of their own assets toward the bail package were also not revealed.
‘Everybody associated with this is suffering from the lynch mob mentality. They are worried, even frightened,’ Basham said.
Maxwell appears to be equally concerned about her safety as her bail request includes armed security guards to keep an eye on her day and night.
Her lawyers also said she would have electronic monitoring should the judge agree to release her from the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn.
Maxwell is scheduled to face a July trial on charges that she recruited three teenage girls for Epstein to abuse in the mid-1990s.
Her first attempt at bail shortly after her July arrest was rejected.
‘Ms Maxwell vehemently maintains her innocence and is committed to defending herself,’ the lawyers wrote.
‘She wants nothing more than to remain in this country to fight the allegations against her, which are based on the uncorroborated testimony of a handful of witnesses about events that took place over 25 years ago.’
Maxwell is accused of helping procure young girls for Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged sex trafficking ring. She and Epstein are pictured together in New York City in 1995
To support the bail request, the lawyers included a letter from Maxwell’s spouse.
They said the letter tells how Maxwell was forced to leave her family and drop out of public view, not because she was eluding law enforcement, but because of ‘the intense media frenzy and threats following the arrest and death of Jeffrey Epstein’.
Epstein killed himself in a federal Manhattan lockup in August 2019 as he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges.
The lawyers also included letters from several friends of Maxwell’s, including one who wrote: ‘I observed her grow up and become a lovely, witty, resourceful, scrupulous and trustworthy human being.
The letter from Borgerson (pictured) tells how Maxwell was forced to leave her family and drop out of public view, not because she was eluding law enforcement, but because of ‘the intense media frenzy and threats following the arrest and death of Jeffrey Epstein’
‘Additionally, a ferocious work ethic and Ghislaine was no exception in deeply absorbing, exhibiting and living these values and training.
‘As far as allowing my own young children and or their friends to visit, both before and at any time in the future, the answer is an unequivocal YES.
‘I wish further and most critically as it obtains to this bail hearing, to attest to the loving relationship she has with her husband which I have personally witnessed on many different occasions.’
Another friend described knowing Maxwell since their teenage years, writing: ‘My parents trusted Ghislaine with me when I was aged 12, 15, and 19, all key points during my adolescence.
‘Because of her I have known more of the world and have my imagination ignited and expanded in ways I could not have imagined.’
Two others described themselves as longtime friends of the entire Maxwell family, with likening Ghislaine to her late father Robert Maxwell.
‘She has her father’s charisma and has a genuine warmth,’ one wrote. ‘I would describe her as a woman of principle, very disciplined with an extraordinary work ethic, instilled by both her parents.’
Robert Maxwell is known as one of Britain’s most powerful media magnates and most notorious fraudsters who spent his business career investing in Israel’s economy after losing most of his family during the Holocaust and moving to the UK to build a publishing empire.
He died aged 68 in suspicious circumstances after falling off his megayacht in 1991. After his death, he was revealed to have stolen £500million ($623 million) from employee pension funds.
The second friend who said they knew the Maxwell family ‘for most of my life’ described Ghislaine as ‘mature’, ‘sensitive’ and ‘quite obviously grounded in good human values’.
‘She does not lie,’ the friend wrote. ‘She is no “chicken” – it would be totally unlike her to run away from the charges leveled against her.
‘In fact the idea of not “facing the music” is totally against the values of every single Maxwell, because both their parents always emphasized personal responsibility – specifically to face Bob’s temper. These people consider running away their greatest shame.’
A spokesperson for prosecutors declined to comment when approached by the Associated Press.
Read the bail proposal below:
EXCLUSIVE: Ghislaine Maxwell’s stepchildren were ‘heartbroken’ by her arrest because they thought of her as their ‘proxy mother’
Ghislaine Maxwell‘s stepchildren were heartbroken by her arrest because they thought of her as their ‘proxy mother’, one of her representatives claimed in an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com.
PR executive Brian Basham said Scott Borgerson, Maxwell’s husband, is not the only one who has been suffering since her arrest in July.
Borgerson has a 13-year-old son and a 10-year-old daughter with his ex-wife Rebecca, who he divorced before moving in with Maxwell to a $2.4million home in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts.
The children were shocked when Maxwell was arrested on allegations she procured girls as young as 14 for Jeffrey Epstein, Basham claimed.
Basham, who is based in the UK and is coordinating efforts to free Maxwell, told DailyMail.com: ‘Scott is devastated and so are his children because Ghislaine has been their proxy mother.
‘They had been living in perfect harmony until this broke. I’m told Scott’s kids have had to be taken out of school because of all the attention’.
Basham said the prosecution of Maxwell and her treatment in prison were completely unjust.
He said: ‘This is evil….it’s like something out of North Korea, not America’.
Ghislaine Maxwell’s stepchildren were heartbroken by her arrest because they thought of her as their ‘proxy mother’, one of her representatives claimed in an exclusive interview with DailyMail.com last week. Pictured: Borgerson’s ex-wife Rebecca their two children
Borgerson is believed to have met Maxwell six years ago through speaking engagements connected to ocean preservation, a subject on which they share a passion. They were both pictured speaking at the Arctic Circle Assembly in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 2014 (left and right)
Basham’s portrait of Maxwell living an idyllic family life with children around is a jarring contrast to the claims of her alleged victims.
They have described her as Epstein’s chief recruiter, lieutenant and the ‘mastermind’ behind his international sex trafficking operation that preyed on underage girls.
As Sarah Ransome, one Epstein victim, said in an interview: ‘She orchestrated the whole thing for Jeffrey’.
Ahead of Basham’s interview a report claimed that Maxwell was prepared to offer a $30million bail package to get free before Christmas.
Some $25million was believed to be coming from Borgerson, a wealthy former chief executive of shipping data company CargoMetrics, however when the official filing emerged on Monday his contribution was significantly smaller.
The other $5million was expected to come from Maxwell’s siblings.
Basham said there was an ongoing discussion about Borgerson’s name being redacted from the bail application to avoid more attention but his name was ‘everywhere in July’ so it was hardly a secret.
Ahead of Basham’s interview a report claimed that Maxwell was prepared to offer a $30million bail package to get free before Christmas. Roughly $5million of the package was believed to be coming from Maxwell’s siblings, including her brothers Kevin and Ian Maxwell, who like Maxwell (pictured back row, center with her siblings and father) are the children of the late disgraced British newspaper tycoon Robert Maxwell
DailyMail.com was the first to report that Borgerson and Maxwell were an item after Epstein was arrested last August.
Borgerson, who is 14 years Maxwell’s junior, left his wife in 2014 and tried to reconcile before finally divorcing her in December 2015.
Asked when Maxwell and Borgerson got married, Basham said ‘2016 resonates’ as the year the wedding took place, but claimed he did not know any other details.
That year was a big one for the couple and in April 2016 Maxwell sold her New York townhouse for $16million.
In June a woman called ‘Jennifer Ellmax’ – a combination of names Maxwell has used in the past – appeared on a building permit for Manchester-by-the-sea home three days before it was sold to an LLC to disguise the owners.
Sources said that Maxwell was a homebody who did not leave the house much and liked to go swimming in the ocean and jogging.
When Borgerson’s children would come to stay Maxwell would be there and she reportedly made them lunch and drove them to school.
Basham said that Maxwell did not flee the US last August when Epstein was arrested ‘because she thinks she’s innocent’.
He said that having a husband in the US was a factor, but she was clear in her mind she did nothing wrong.
The reports said that Borgerson, who at 44 is 14 years Maxwell’s junior – she is 58 – left his wife Rebecca (left and right) in 2014 and tried to reconcile before finally divorcing her in December 2015
Since Ghislaine was arrested Basham has been spearheading what has become known as ‘Operation Get Ghislaine Out’.
Over the past five months she has been held in a 9ft by 7ft cell and claims that she lost at least 20lbs in weight and some of her hair because of the poor prison diet.
Her lawyers have said that she is woken up every 15 minutes with a torchlight to be searched even though she is not a suicide risk.
They claim that the Bureau of Prisons is making an example of her to overcompensate for its failings which led Epstein to hang himself in his cell last August while in another federal prison in New York.
Basham said: ‘The Department of Justice is perverting the course of justice. It’s outrageous. There is no reason for her to be in prison and in fact there’s no reason she should have been arrested.
‘Why wasn’t she arrested when Epstein was arrested?
‘The way she is being treated is evil, just evil. How can you prepare properly for your defense when you are being woken up every 15 minutes with a torch and are sleep deprived?
‘It’s ridiculous she’s having to offer so much money in bail – Bernie Madoff was only $10m and he got bail’.
In October reports said that Borgerson had stepped down as chief executive of CargoMetrics to avoid being a ‘distraction’.
DailyMail.com can reveal that two weeks after Maxwell was denied bail on July 14, Borgerson took back control of a $1.2million apartment in Boston he owns.
By doing so it would allow him to more easily sell it to raise funds.
He paid the nominal sum of $1 to John McBrine, an estate planning specialist with Boston based lawyers Nutter, Fish and McLennan who have worked with Borgerson and Maxwell before.
McBrine’s online profile says his expertise is ‘implementing strategies to minimize estate and gift tax consequences of wealth transfers across generations’.
He also helps create ‘sophisticated estate plans for clients with complex asset profiles and difficult family dynamics’.
