Ghislaine Maxwell’s sex trafficking conviction has been upheld by a US judge.
Maxwell had requested a retrial after it emerged that one of the jurors had been sexually abused but had falsely stated before the trial that he had not been.
Asked in pre-trial screening whether he had been a victim of sexual abuse, the juror had ticked “no”, but he later contradicted this in TV interviews, admitting he had been sexually abused as a child.
Maxwell was convicted in December of helping late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein to sexually abuse teenage girls.
Lawyers for Maxwell, 60, would have had the juror struck from the panel if he had answered honestly, and said the false statement had denied her a fair trial.
But prosecutor said Maxwell’s lawyers could not prove the juror was biased.
On Friday, in her decision, US Circuit Judge Alison Nathan said the juror – known as Juror 50 – had testified truthfully at a last month’s hearing over Maxwell’s request for a re-trial.
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Judge Nathan wrote: “His failure to disclose his prior sexual abuse during the jury selection process was highly unfortunate, but not deliberate.
“The court further concludes that Juror 50 harboured no bias toward the defendant and could serve as a fair and impartial juror.”
