Jeffrey Epstein’s former girlfriend and alleged groomer was finally arrested after a nearly year-long search by federal authorities that began just after Epstein himself was caught last summer.
Jeffrey Epstein’s former girlfriend and alleged groomer was finally arrested after a nearly year-long search by federal authorities that began just after Epstein himself was caught last summer.
While Maxwell was apprehended by agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) early Thursday in the small town of Bradford, New Hampshire, the U. S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) is handling the inquiry. As the result of a brief hearing on Thursday afternoon between Maxwell and the government, the SDNY will have unopposed jurisdiction.
That result was hardly a surprise. But the specific SDNY unit taking charge of the Maxwell case immediately raised some eyebrows.
During a press conference, Acting U. S. Attorney Audrey Strauss noted that the SDNY’s Public Corruption Unit would—like the Epstein case before—be tasked with overseeing the prosecution.
“I worked at SDNY and did sex trafficking cases,” noted former federal and state prosecutor and current CNN legal analyst Elie Honig via Twitter. “They do NOT run out of Public Corruption – unless there is some potential angle against a public official.”
The Department of Justice (DOJ) describes the unit on its website:
“A case like this ordinarily would not be staffed out of Public Corruption,” Honig told Law&Crime. “It would ordinarily be staffed out of what’s now known as the Violent and Organized Crime Unit.”
The Violent and Organized Crime Unit is where the SDNY’s human and sex trafficking coordinators are located.
“The fact that it is staffed out of Public Corruption tells me that a public official–past or present–is involved in at least some capacity,” Honig continued.
