Trial attorneys representing Ghislaine Maxwell are suing for unpaid legal bills totaling $850,000 and alleging that some of her family are concealing her multi-million dollar estate.
Maxwell’s former lawyers at the law firm Haddon, Morgan & Foreman (HMF) claim that while they tried – unsuccessfully – to defend her, Maxwell’s family members piled up debt and plotted to conceal her actual riches from them.
According to court documents, attorneys from the company filed a civil lawsuit against the disgraced British sex trafficker, who at the end of 2021 was found guilty on five out of six charges, as well as her brother Kevin and her ex-husband Scott Borgerson.
Maxwell, 60, was found guilty after the FBI accused her of enticing juveniles and trafficking in minors for sex in connection with her friendship with the late paedophile Jeffery Epstein. She received a 20-year jail term.
She is presently incarcerated in a Florida low-security facility where she is completing her sentence.
The tiny Colorado-based business HMF, which claims to have defended Maxwell in cases filed by victims of her ex-boyfriend Epstein going back to 2017, is now suing her family for $850,000, compounding her problems.
According to HMF, Kevin Maxwell would be in charge of paying them for their legal services provided to his younger sister.
Although the attorneys claim they quickly “had concerns about Ms Maxwell’s desire and capacity to pay her financial responsibilities,” they did so in a filing on August 22.
According to the court document, which was discovered by Australian podcaster Jen Tarran, “based on developments during the first few weeks of the engagement, HMF developed concerns regarding the representation, including HMF’s role in the case and Ms. Maxwell’s willingness and ability to meet her financial obligations.”
The defence claims that shortly after her detention by the FBI in 2020, they asked for a $250,000 retainer before the trial had started. According to HMF, half of this sum was swiftly paid, and the business sent Kevin Maxwell an email asking for updates on the remaining sum.
According to HMF’s court complaint to a Denver court, he disregarded the communications and continued to fall behind on payments to the legal firm in 2021. Instead, according to the attorneys, Kevin Maxwell paid “a few intermittent payments.”
As Ghislaine Maxwell’s trial in November 2021 drew nearer, according to HMF, the attorneys threatened to withdraw their defence of her on November 5 if a bigger $1 million retainer was not paid.
According to the lawsuit, Kevin Maxwell reaffirmed “the pledge we as a family have made to fulfil the fees owing and sought by you both in good faith and as a binding obligation.”
He expressed his “sincere hope” that the legal practise will maintain its current personnel levels during the “important stage” of his sister’s lawsuit.
According to the petition, “HMF continues to provide all necessary resources to Ms. Maxwell’s defence, depending on Mr. Maxwell’s devotion.” However, when the company expressed concerns to Kevin Maxwell on two more times, he once again pledged to pay.
According to HMF, “Mr. Maxwell really had no current intention of doing so.”
The legal company claims that Kevin Maxwell often informed it that Scott Borgerson, the ex-husband of his sister, was in charge of her assets and that it was his reason the payments for their services were being held up.
HMF alleges in its complaint that Borgerson formed two limited liability corporations, utilised Maxwell’s riches to purchase two Boston condominiums, as well as other properties in Massachusetts and New Hampshire, to conceal Ghislaine’s wealth.
In Maxwell’s trial, the prosecution claimed that she had the potential to “conceal her actual fortune,” citing the fact that Maxwell had moved the majority of her $20.2 million worth of assets to a trust under his management shortly after her marriage to Borgerson in 2016.
By the time the trial came to a close in December 2021, Maxwell owed HMF legal bills of $950,000. Midway through January of this year, Kevin Maxwell paid the firm $143,500, but the attorneys claim the remaining balance is still owed.
According to the complaint, “Mr. Maxwell misrepresented to the company that he would make it current no later than February 28, 2022 on January 14, 2022.”
In truth, Mr. Maxwell would never again send money to HMF to settle Ms. Maxwell’s amount, which was still more than $850,000. The lawsuit continues, “HMF has been harmed by Mr. Maxwell’s deception in an amount to be shown at trial.”
Additionally, the attorneys for HMF are bringing a claim against Borgerson for “wrongfully encumbering Ms Maxwell’s assets, joint marital assets, and/or assets pledged to support her defence, impeding her capacity to discharge her commitments.”
He and Maxwell, according to their accusation, “shared the purpose of safeguarding such assets from creditors, particularly HMF.”
According to the petition, HMF is entitled to a judgement for one and a half times the value of the transferred assets or one and a half times the sum required to fulfil its claim against Ms. Maxwell, whichever is smaller.
For sex trafficking of young girls, Maxwell was given a jail term at a low-security facility in Danbury, Connecticut, in July. Later, she was sent to Tallahassee.
Following a trial that lasted over a month, she was found guilty of federal sex trafficking charges in December of last year.
After five days of deliberations, the jury ultimately decided that she was guilty of five of the six counts brought against her, including one for enticing minors to perform sex acts with Epstein.
After describing Maxwell’s conduct as “heinous and predatory,” Judge Alison Nathan then sentenced him to 240 months in prison, followed by five years of supervised release, on June 28.
Additionally, she issued a $750,000 punishment while noting that Maxwell had received a $10 million bequest from Epstein upon his death.
Judge Nathan at the time made it plain that the case needed for a “very large sentence” that conveyed a “unmistakable message” that similar crimes would be punished: “Ms. Maxwell collaborated with Epstein to choose young victims who were vulnerable and played a crucial role in enabling sexual abuse.”
At this point, MailOnline has been unable to reach Kevin Maxwell, although he will probably fight any legal action.
After Jeffery Epstein committed himself in 2019 while awaiting prosecution, focus shifted to his longtime companion and ex-girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell, who was detained a year later and convicted in December after a high-profile trial.
During Maxwell’s trial, which lasted many weeks, four women testified against her: Annie Farmer, Kate, Carolyn, and victim “Jane.”
Over the course of three weeks, the jury heard how Maxwell “served up” minors to Epstein at his Florida house and delighted in her position as the “Lady of the House.”
Lawyers said Maxwell was Epstein’s “right hand” between 1994 and 2004 and paid $200 for sexually explicit massages or possibly took part in the assault.
The jury was informed that the victims, some of whom were as young as 14, received a comparable sum of money if they brought acquaintances to Epstein.
Prosecutors summoned 24 witnesses throughout the trial to paint a picture for the jury of life inside Epstein’s houses, a topic of public curiosity and rumour ever since his arrest in Florida in 2006 in a child sex case.
A cleaner said that Epstein, a financier who made contacts with powerful politicians and business tycoons, wanted him to be “blind, deaf, and stupid” about his personal life.
Aboard the testimony stand, pilots mentioned famous people who flew on Epstein’s private aircraft, including Prince Andrew of Britain, Bill Clinton, and Donald Trump.
A foldable massage table that had previously been used by Epstein and a “black book” that included the contact information for some of the victims under the title “massages” were also shown to the jury as tangible evidence.
According to bank records, he transferred Maxwell $30.7 million.
Additionally, the prosecution provided a 58-page housekeeping handbook that they said Maxwell had prepared, detailing every every element of maintaining the Palm Beach home. Numerous checklists were provided, along with directions on when to change the toothpaste and which types of lotions to purchase for each region of the home.
One directive given to every member of the domestic staff that the prosecution seized onto was, “You see nothing, hear nothing, say nothing.”
However, the evidence of four women, who claimed to have been mistreated by Maxwell and Epstein when they were young, formed the basis of the case.
Three witnesses—Jane, a television actress; Kate, a former British model; and Carolyn, a mother who is now in recovery from drug addiction—spoke in court using only their first names or pseudonyms to safeguard their privacy.
The fourth was Farmer, who decided to go by her true name after recently coming out with her accusations.
The testimony of Carolyn, one of numerous impoverished teenagers who lived close to Epstein’s Florida house in the early 2000s and accepted an offer to provide massages in return for $100 notes, was the most heartbreaking.
Carolyn testified to the jury that Maxwell made all the arrangements even though she was aware the girl was just 14 at the time.
When Jane was just 14 years old in 1994, she said that Epstein ordered her to accompany him into a pool house on the Palm Beach estate, where he masturbated on her.
While this was going on, Jane testified to the jury, saying, “I was paralysed in dread,” and adding that this was the first time she had ever seen a penis. Additionally, she accused Maxwell personally of taking part in her assault.
Jane was questioned by Maxwell’s attorney about her delay in coming forward.
I was afraid, she said in response. I felt humiliated and ashamed. I didn’t want any of this information about myself to be public.
Additionally, Kate said that she was 17 years old when she was hired by Maxwell in London in 1994, and she vividly recalled how she had Maxwell over for tea before having her come back and give Epstein a massage.
In her horrifying testimony, Kate recalled how Maxwell shut the door behind her while Epstein laid nude in front of her on a massage table. Maxwell asked her after one of these encounters, “Did you have fun? Was it effective?
Farmer recalled how Epstein enticed her to his ranch in New Mexico when she was 16 by promising to assist hundreds of other intelligent children.
As opposed to that, it was only her and Maxwell, who then began massaging her breasts before Epstein joined her in bed.
Farmer concluded her account of the incident by saying: “I believe this was all a pattern of them working on confusing my limits and having me wonder what was good and what was not right with the ultimate objective of sexually assaulting me.”
Before finding Maxwell guilty on five out of six charges, the jury deliberated for five whole days.
Despite assertions by her lawyers that she had been losing weight and hair as a result of the unfavourable circumstances in jail before to trial, Maxwell often embraced her attorneys in court and seemed to be in excellent health.
She informed the judge that there was no need for her to testify since the government had not established its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Given her origins as an affluent socialite and the descendant of the late newspaper magnate Robert Maxwell, who mysteriously jumped from his yacht in the Canary Islands in 1991, Maxwell’s fall from grace is all the more astounding.
When Maxwell met Epstein around the time her father passed away, her attorneys attempted to claim that Maxwell was “weak” because of Robert Maxwell’s aggressive actions toward his children.
She seems to have swapped over one domineering, manipulating parent for Epstein, a guy she dated before taking over his sex trafficking operation.
Although the precise number of Epstein’s victims may never be known, 150 women from all around the globe received $121 million from the fund established to compensate them.
Prior to sentence, the majority of the victim impact statements were made public, and they were scathing in their criticism of Maxwell.
They included Virginia Roberts, who earlier this year reached a settlement with Prince Andrew in a lawsuit for an estimated $12 million over allegations that she was coerced into having sex with him three times when she was only 17 years old.
Roberts claims that Maxwell approached her at Florida’s Mar-a-Lago club when she was 16 years old and recruited her.
She claims that Maxwell and Epstein did “unthinkable things” to her in her victim impact statement.
Without a doubt, Jeffrey Epstein was a horrible child molester, according to the statement.
But if it weren’t for you, I would have never met Jeffrey Epstein. You unlocked the gates of hell for me and many others. Then, Ghislaine, you betrayed us by using your femininity while leading the rest of us along like a wolf in sheep’s clothes.
“Ghislaine, you need to live out the rest of your days in a cell.” You deserve to spend all of your time in a cage, exactly as you did to your victims.
‘I recall sitting at my workstation in a Houston hospital literally shivering after viewing the picture of Maxwell with Virginia Giuffre and Prince Andrew because it became evident to me how their scam had persisted,’ Farmer writes in her victim impact statement.
Having grown up in Scotland, former South African model Sarah Ransome said that Maxwell and Epstein reduced her to “little more than a sex object with a heartbeat.”
She attempted to jump over a cliff when fleeing Epstein’s private island in the Caribbean, but Maxwell caught her before she could.
Maxwell was his right-hand lady, according to Ransome. She served as the Five Star General for several recruiters and other individuals that gave Epstein’s predatory behaviour the means and cover to occur.
“Epstein and Maxwell were experts at spotting young, helpless girls and young women to exploit,” one observer said. The Epstein-Maxwell dungeon of sexual torment was similar to Hotel California in that you could enter it on faith but never leave. Ghislaine and Jeffrey made sure of it.
After Maxwell’s attorneys questioned statements made by one of the jurors, Scotty David, the sentence was postponed.
He said that while filling out his juror questionnaire, he did not mention his history of sexual assault.
Judge Nathan summoned David back to court for a hearing during which she questioned him and eventually determined that his failure to disclose was an accident.