US President Donald Trump, like several other well-known individuals, has previously been in contact with the financier and several media outlets have stated that Trump appears in several places in the investigation material.
In late July, Ghislaine Maxwell was interviewed by the US Department of Justice and on Friday, transcripts of the interviews were made public. The convicted 63-year-old says she "does not believe" that Trump and Epstein were close friends, but she describes Trump as a "gentleman in all respects" during the time they spent together in the early 90s.
"I actually never saw the president in any kind of massage situation".
"I never witnessed the president in any inappropriate situation in any way. The president was never inappropriate to anyone," she also says in the interviews.
Not promised anything
The release of the two-day interview is being made "in the interest of transparency", according to Deputy Justice Minister Todd Blanche. Previously, harsh criticism has been directed at Trump's administration for not releasing more documents from the investigation, despite Trump's promises.
From the over 300-page transcript, it appears that the Department of Justice did not promise Maxwell anything in exchange for her testimony. After the interview, however, Maxwell was moved, without apparent reason, to a prison with the lowest security classification.
In connection with the interview, Trump said in an interview that no one had asked him to pardon Maxwell.
Billionaire Epstein, according to the authorities, exposed hundreds of underage girls to sexual abuse. Maxwell, Epstein's long-time partner who is also said to have helped him recruit young girls, is serving a 20-year prison sentence for, among other things, sexual exploitation of children.
Dismisses the suicide
One of the victims was Virginia Giuffre, who took her own life earlier this year. She claimed that Maxwell discovered her at Trump's spa at Mar-a-Lago in Florida in 2000, when she was 17, and hired her as Epstein's masseuse - which led to several sexual assaults. During the first day of the interview, Maxwell says she never did "as far as I remember", a statement that was later toned down.
"But it's not impossible that I may have asked someone from there," she says, according to CNN.
According to the prosecution, Epstein paid her $30 million to recruit the girls. Money that, according to Maxwell, was a loan for investments. Maxwell also dismisses the official version that Epstein took his own life in a detention center in August 2019 while awaiting trial.
An investigation into Jeffrey Epstein begins as early as 2005 when a 14-year-old girl tells the police that she was molested by Epstein in his home in Florida. The investigation grows and in 2007, he is charged in a federal court.
After an agreement with the prosecutor, Epstein is sentenced to 18 months in prison for buying sex. He is released after 13 months.
The case comes to light again in 2018 after a series of articles in the Miami Herald where women come forward and accuse him of sexual abuse.
In the summer of 2019, Epstein is arrested at an airport in New Jersey. The new charge against him concerns abuse of dozens of underage girls between 2002 and 2005. According to the prosecution, Epstein is said to have tried to buy the silence of witnesses with millions. Epstein denies the crime.
On August 10, 2019, Epstein is found lifeless in his cell in the detention center on Manhattan. He is taken to a hospital where he is declared dead. According to the US Department of Justice, he apparently took his own life.
