The images could have come from the scrapbook of any relatively affluent couple: a graying man and slightly younger woman in casual, unrehearsed moments — standing on a wooden footbridge, astride a motorcycle, at a table with a drink.
What sets them apart are the people they depict: Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier who killed himself in a federal jail cell in 2019 while he was being held on sex-trafficking charges, and Ghislaine Maxwell, his onetime girlfriend, who is currently being tried on sex-trafficking and other charges in Federal District Court in Manhattan.
More than a dozen of the photographs were displayed last week during Ms. Maxwell’s trial, showing the carefree surface of a relationship that, according to witness testimony, masked much darker depths. They were introduced by the government over defense objections, as prosecutors sought to document, through the images, Ms. Maxwell’s longstanding relationship with Mr. Epstein.
Now, as the defense prepares to present its case when the trial resumes on Thursday, lawyers for Ms. Maxwell will attempt to convince jurors that the woman in the pictures is little more than a scapegoat for Mr. Epstein, one of the most notorious sex offenders in recent American history.
Source Article from https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/16/nyregion/ghislaine-maxwell-trial-epstein-pictures.html
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