🔗 Share this article Federal Judge Rules Justice Department Can Release Maxwell Court Documents A federal judge has ruled that the Justice Department can proceed with the public release of investigative materials from the sex-trafficking case against Ghislaine Maxwell, the longtime confidant of Jeffrey Epstein. Judicial Ruling Paves the Way for Document Disclosure Judge Paul A. Engelmayer made the decision after the Justice Department formally requested in November to make public grand jury transcripts and evidence from the cases of Epstein and Maxwell. This request could lead to the release of a vast number of previously unreleased documents. The court's ruling, which comes in the wake of the recent enactment of the Transparency Act, means these records could be made public within a 10-day window. The legislation mandates the DOJ to provide Epstein-related records in a digitally searchable form by December 19. Judicial Pattern of Disclosure Engelmayer is the second judge to allow the DOJ to release previously secret Epstein court records. Recently, a Florida judge approved a similar request to release transcripts from an earlier federal probe into Epstein from the 2000s. A further petition concerning records from Epstein's 2019 sex-trafficking case is still under consideration. Breadth of Disclosure Greatly Expanded The Justice Department has stated that Congress aimed for this disclosure when it enacted the transparency act. The most recent filing dramatically enlarged the scope of files slated for release to include eighteen distinct types of evidence gathered during the wide-ranging probe. These documents are reported to include items such as: Search warrants Banking documents Notes from victim interviews Electronic device data Material from prior probes in Florida Case Background Jeffrey Epstein, a financier, was arrested in July 2019 on federal charges. He was found dead in a prison cell a month later, with his death ruled a suicide. Ghislaine Maxwell was found guilty of related charges in December 2021 and is currently serving a two-decade sentence. The federal authorities has indicated it is consulting victims and their attorneys and plans to redact records to protect survivors' identities and stop the sharing of explicit imagery. Previous Disclosures Tens of thousands of pages of documents related to Epstein and Maxwell have already been released through different channels, including civil cases, official releases, and Freedom of Information Act requests. Much of the material the Justice Department now intends to disclose originates from reports, photographs, videos gathered by police in Florida and the federal prosecutor's office there, both of which looked into Epstein in the 2000s. That federal probe ended in 2008 with a then-secret arrangement that allowed Epstein to avoid federal charges by pleading guilty to a state charge. He served 13 months in a work-release program.