Ghislaine Maxwell is denied bail for SECOND time

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Ghislaine Maxwell has been denied bail for a second time on Monday after a judge ruled that she remained a ‘flight risk’.

Judge Alison Nathan said that nothing submitted to the federal court in New York by Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged madam had changed her original decision.

Judge Nathan was unmoved by the $28.5 million bail package that Maxwell and her husband Scott Borgerson offered to the court.

She ruled that ‘no conditions of release can reasonably assure the Defendant’s appearance at future proceedings’.

The ruling means that Maxwell will remain in the grim Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York until at least July next year when her trial is due to take place. 

Brian Basham, a British public relations executive who has been coordinating ‘Operation Get Ghislaine Out’ said he was shocked by the judge’s decision, adding that Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged madam would be ‘devastated’ by the ruling. 

He said: ‘It’s grotesque and against the laws of natural justice. It’s just wrong to deny somebody the chance to properly prepare for their defense.

‘She’s going to be locked up in prison for months now. The judge has given in to the lynch mob, that’s what this is.

‘Ghislaine will be devastated. Her birthday was on Christmas Day and she was hoping to be out by then to be with her family.

‘This seems like a show trial, it’s ridiculous. I hesitate to draw comparisons with China but that’s how it feels.’ 

Basham said Maxwell’s lawyers would appeal the ruling ‘immediately’. 

Maxwell’s legal team did not return a request for comment.

The court ruling reads in full: ‘The Court concludes that none of the new information that the Defendant presented in support of her application has a material bearing on the Court’s determination that she poses a flight risk.

‘Furthermore, for substantially the same reasons as the Court determined that detention was warranted in the initial bail hearing, the Court again concludes that no conditions of release can reasonably assure the Defendant’s appearance at future proceedings.

‘In reaching that conclusion, the Court considers the nature and circumstances of the offenses charged, the weight of the evidence against the Defendant, the history and characteristics of the Defendant, and the nature and seriousness of the danger that the Defendant’s release would pose.

‘The Government does not contend that the Defendant poses a danger to the community. Nonetheless the Court determines that the other three factors warrant detention.

‘The Court also finds that the Defendant’s proposed bail conditions would not reasonably assure her appearance at future proceedings

‘As a result, the Court concludes that the Government has met its burden of persuasion that the Defendant poses a flight risk and that pre-trial detention continues to be warranted.’ 

Last week it was revealed Maxwell claimed she only talked about divorcing her husband after she was arrested to ‘protect him’.

The alleged ‘madam’ for Jeffrey Epstein said that she wanted to shield Borgerson from the ‘terrible consequences of being associated with her’.

Maxwell told pretrial services a split could be on the cards as a way to ‘create distance’ between themselves. 

Prosecutors have alleged the reality is she made ‘plainly inconsistent’ statements which undermined her claim that her husband was a strong tie America she would never abandon.

Maxwell tried to explain the discrepancy in documents as part of her effort to get bail before Christmas from the federal prison where she is currently in custody.  

Maxwell, 58, and Borgerson, 44, a tech entrepreneur, have pledged $22.5m of property and assets to try and free her while she awaits trial for procuring girls for Epstein.

Another $5m would be put up by family and friends and Maxwell would give up her three passports and submit to home confinement.

In a filing in federal court in New York, Maxwell confirmed the claim made by prosecutors that she was talking about divorce after her arrest, a detail she failed to disclose herself.

The document states that the idea of divorce was to ‘protect him…from the terrible consequences of being associated with her’.

During her first bail hearing in July, when Maxwell was remanded in custody, she only disclosed she had a $5m house in the UK and her own personal assets.

Weeks later Borgerson appears to have agreed to come forward and offer up all their assets for a renewed bail package. 

The filing states: ‘She and her spouse therefore had no reason to continue discussing divorce, which neither of them wanted in the first place.

‘Nor was there any reason for her spouse to refrain from stepping forward as a co-signer.

‘In sum, the government has offered nothing but unsupported innuendo to suggest that Ms. Maxwell’s relationship with her spouse is not a powerful tie to this country’. 

Maxwell’s letter to the court makes reference to the arrest last week of French model scout Jean-Luc Brunel, allegedly one of the key players in Epstein’s sex trafficking ring.

Brunel, 74, is accused of rape, sexual assault and sexual harassment of children by the authorities in France, which has no extradition treaty with America.

Lawyers for Maxwell, who has French citizenship, wrote: ‘Any incentive Ms. Maxwell might have to flee to France has been greatly diminished by the recent arrest in France of Jean-Luc Brunel, who reportedly is under investigation for alleged sexual assaults by Jeffrey Epstein’.

In the letter, Maxwell’s lawyers decry her treatment as ‘the apparent substitute’ for Epstein, who killed himself last August while awaiting trial.

They claim that prosecutors have ‘lost all objectivity’ when examining her finances and seem intent on seeing ‘any fact involving Ms. Maxwell in the worst possible light’.

They claim that despite having $2m in personal assets and $22.5m in the name of her husband Maxwell has ‘no certain future income stream’.

Maxwell is accused of procuring girls as young as 14 for Epstein between 1994 and 1997.

She is also accused of perjuring herself in a separate civil case and denies all the allegations.

If convicted she faces up to 35 years in jail.