NEW YORK — Ghislaine Maxwell deserves a new trial because one of the jurors who convicted her of sex trafficking withheld that he was a childhood sex abuse victim, a lawyer for the British socialite argued in court papers.
Attorney Christian Everdell asked Manhattan Federal Judge Alison Nathan in a Tuesday letter to “right a grievous wrong” by the juror, Scotty David, who allegedly did not reveal he was molested when he was a kid during the jury selection process.
“Juror 50′s responses to the jury questionnaire and questions posed to him during in-person voir dire corrupted” the trial from the outset, wrote Everdell, and warrant a complete do-over.
The argument was included in a request that Maxwell’s original motion for a new trial remain under seal.
David made the admission on a posttrial media tour but said he could not remember disclosing it in jury selection. Maxwell’s lawyers say he didn’t.
David has asked to see a copy of his questionnaire and his “exact” answers in court filings, but Everdell asked the judge not to share the paperwork.
Sharing David’s answers with him could “allow him to plan out and tailor his responses, or even potentially spoliate evidence, to paint himself and his conduct in the best light possible,” wrote Everdell.
Nathan has yet to rule on the request and one from the government to conduct an inquiry into the allegations.
Maxwell was convicted Dec. 29 of facilitating Jeffrey Epstein’s abuse of teenage girls for a decade beginning in the mid-1990s.
During her monthlong trial, jurors heard of how she coaxed minors into his orbit and scheduled them for his systematic sexual abuse, sometimes participating in it herself.
The 60-year-old faces decades in federal prison when sentenced this June.
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