A federal judge on Monday denied the Department of Justice’s request to unseal grand jury materials in Ghislaine Maxwell’s criminal case.
In his 31-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer, a Barack Obama appointee, says that the grand jury materials do not identify anyone other than Epstein or Maxwell as having had sexual contact with a minor.
The DOJ request came as supporters of President Donald Trump have pushed for more disclosures related to Maxwell and her co-conspirator Jeffrey Epstein, the deceased financier and accused sex trafficker.
Trump directed Attorney General Pam Bondi last month to release "any and all pertinent Grand Jury testimony" in the Epstein case.
The judge noted that the government’s evidence at Maxwell's weekslong trial included the testimony of women who were sexually abused as girls by Epstein and Maxwell, people who worked for Epstein and Maxwell, and law enforcement officials. Some of the evidence included photos and items collected from Epstein’s residences, flight logs and an address book.
The evidence before the grand juries, meanwhile, was presented on a single day.
"On that day, it heard testimony from one person: a law enforcement agent who, acting as a summary witness, testified to information obtained in the Government’s investigation to support the charges in the proposed indictment," he wrote, saiying that agent was "responding to tightly structured questions" from an Assistant United States Attorney.
Engelmayer said that the government’s reasoning for unsealing the Maxwell grand jury materials — that it came after “abundant public interest” — “fails at the threshold.”
“Its entire premise — that the Maxwell grand jury materials would bring to light meaningful new information about Epstein’s and Maxwell’s crimes, or the Government’s investigation into them—is demonstrably false,” he wrote.
The Department of Justice and Maxwell’s attorney, David Oscar Markus, didn’t immediately respond to NBC News’ requests for comment on the decision.
In his ruling, Engelmayer said that the government’s submissions failed to prove its claim that the grand jury materials “contained undisclosed information of significant historical or public interest.” He said that “with only very minor exceptions,” the evidence from the Maxwell grand juries is “a matter of public record.”
Engelmayer even pointed to the Trump administration’s admission that much of the material "was made publicly available at [Maxwell’s] trial or has otherwise been publicly reported through the public statements of victims and witnesses.”
Thus, a member of the public familiar with the Maxwell trial who reviewed the grand jury materials that the DOJ proposed to unseal “would thus learn next to nothing new,” the judge said.
"There is no 'there' there," the judge wrote.
He added, “Contrary to the Government’s depiction, the Maxwell grand jury testimony is not a matter of significant historical or public interest. Far from it. It consists of garden-variety summary testimony by two law enforcement agents.”
Engelmayer also said the materials do not identify any person other than Epstein and Maxwell as having had sexual contact with a minor.
He continued by saying that the materials “do not discuss or identify any client of Epstein’s or Maxwell’s. They do not reveal any heretofore unknown means or methods of Epstein’s or Maxwell’s crimes. They do not reveal new venues at which their crimes occurred. They do not reveal new sources of their wealth. They do not explore the circumstances of Epstein’s death. They do not reveal the path of the Government’s investigation.”
Engelmayer argued that one factor in rejecting the unsealing of the transcripts is the “rule of secrecy” in grand juries - and that one of the few reasons to unseal would have been to "expose as disingenuous the Government’s public explanations for moving to unseal."
"A member of the public, appreciating that the Maxwell grand jury materials do not contribute anything to public knowledge, might conclude that the Government’s motion for their unsealing was aimed not at 'transparency' but at diversion—aimed not at full disclosure but at the illusion of such," he wrote.
A similar DOJ request to unseal records in the case against Epstein is pending before another judge.
A third request to unseal grand jury documents relating to the original case against Epstein in Florida in 2005 was denied by another judge last month.
Epstein died in jail while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges in 2019. His death was ruled a suicide, and along with his criminal case, has long been the subject of conspiracy theories. Trump and his allies were among those who spread or supported such theories about the politically connected Epstein during his presidential campaign.
Epstein and Maxwell's social circle included the likes of Trump and former President Bill Clinton.
The move to unseal the grand jury testimony came after fierce public backlash from some Trump supporters to an unsigned joint Justice Department-FBI memo saying they had reviewed the case against Epstein and Maxwell and that no other people would be charged in connection with their trafficking of minors and that no additional material or evidence would be released.
The directive also came hours after The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump had sent a “bawdy” 50th birthday letter to Epstein in 2003. NBC News has not independently verified the documents, and Trump denied sending such a letter. Trump has sued the newspaper’s publisher, two of its reporters and News Corp. founder Rupert Murdoch for defamation.
The newspaper has said it stands by its reporting.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
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