Fox News Flash top entertainment headlines for May 26
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Ghislaine Maxwell, the alleged madam of financier and sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, is the subject of a new documentary.
Blue Ant Studios will produce "Epstein’s Shadow: Ghislaine Maxwell," which will premiere on Peacock on June 24 before landing on U.K.’s Sky on June 28, Deadline reported on Wednesday. According to the outlet, the special will be titled "Ghislaine Maxwell: Epstein’s Shadow" in the U.K.
The outlet shared that the three-hour special promises to take a deep dive into "the powerful, connected, and mysterious" Maxwell, "who was once the heiress to the Maxwell fortune but whose life is rocked by a series of scandals and accusations when she meets Jeffrey Epstein, the serial sex offender."
Dozens of new interviews, in addition to unseen footage of the Maxwell family and previously unpublished photos will be featured, Variety reported.
"There are many unfortunate stories of crimes committed by men against women, but when a woman like Ghislaine Maxwell is accused of this activity, it creates many questions," director Barbara Shearer told Variety. "This series sheds light on Maxwell’s path from her past to the present to unravel the enigma that she is, and takes us from the highest echelons of society to a Brooklyn jail cell awaiting trial while the world watches."
Attorneys for the British socialite urged a judge to toss out a rewritten indictment against her, saying prosecutors just want to blame her for Epstein’s sex crimes. But prosecutors said their complaints aren’t true.
The papers, dated May 7, were filed publicly Tuesday in Manhattan federal court. They are among numerous approaches — so far unsuccessful — that defense lawyers have taken to try to nullify charges alleging their client recruited teenage girls from 1994 to 2004 for Epstein to sexually abuse.
Maxwell, 59, has pleaded not guilty and awaits a November trial from her jail cell, where she has remained since her arrest last July. Three efforts to get her freed on bail, twice with a $28.5 million bail package, have been rejected by a judge. A federal appeals court has also refused to grant bail.
Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. (Photo by Joe Schildhorn/Patrick McMullan via Getty Images)
In the newly released document, defense lawyers brought up many of the same challenges they raised when she was first indicted, including that a non-prosecution agreement Epstein signed with federal prosecutors in Florida in the late 2000s protects her as well.
But they said the rewrite of the indictment that adds a fourth accuser and extends the span of the indictment from 1997 through 2004 "demonstrates just how far the government is willing to go to ‘get’ Ms. Maxwell and disingenuously blame her for the crimes of Jeffrey Epstein."
"No longer content to charge a 25-year-old case based on purported conduct in the 1990s, the government now sweeps in the 2000s through the allegations of one person—Accuser-4," they wrote, using a pseudonym in place of the actual identity.
They said the woman’s allegations were known to prosecutors after the woman made her accusations more than a decade ago and yet Maxwell was not charged or named as a co-conspirator when authorities in Florida pursued cases against Epstein.
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Photo from 2001 that was included in court files shows Prince Andrew with his arm around the waist of 17-year-old Virginia Giuffre who says Jeffrey Epstein paid her to have sex with the prince. Andrew has denied the charges. In the background is Epstein's girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell. (Florida Southern District Court) (U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals)
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In a filing of their own late Tuesday, prosecutors defended their superseding indictment, saying they did not get a chance to speak to the fourth accuser by video until last summer and in person until January.
"The defendant’s argument that the Government acted in bad faith — to the extent she is making such an argument — is based on no evidence whatsoever, and for good reason: it is not true," they wrote in a document dated last Friday.
They said the woman was interviewed only once by federal prosecutors in Florida in the 2000s and was not asked any questions about Maxwell.
Epstein was arrested in July 2019 on sex trafficking charges. He took his own life a month later in a Manhattan federal jail at age 66.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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