Documents related to deceased convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein and his associates were ordered by a federal judge to be unsealed. Several documents filed in a defamation case against ex-Epstein handler and lover Ghislaine Maxwell were ruled by Judge Loretta Preska in a recent decision to be released amid objections they would harm the reputations of the people named in the documents.
Much of the information in the patch of documents is publicly available from the other lawsuit, judge Preska said, so she ordered its release, said a report on Fox 10 Phoenix. The public interest outweighed the privacy rights of the eight “John Does” named in the documents, Preska determined, which are referred to as Does 12, 28, 97, 107, 144, 147, 171, and 183.
Tom Pritzker, the billionaire executive chairman of Hyatt Hotels, is one of the eight individuals. He says that if the documents connecting him to the controversial financier are going to be released, it would cause him reputable harm. But as for these concerns, Preska mostly disagreed. Many of the documents were already available in other legal challenges, said Preska, while adding that their contents did not specify malicious actions.
There was also an objection by Doe 107, saying that it was a violation of their privacy when the documents connecting them to Epstein were released. A former personal assistant to Ghislaine Maxwell is another individual mentioned in the documents. Emmy Tayler was also accused of contributing to the s-xual abuse of her victims. Tayler denied any wrongdoing during her time working for Maxwell, and she also objected to the release. Tayler is also part of another lawsuit.
Documents related to Doe 183 were ordered by judge Preska to become available as well, as they were “subject of intense media coverage.” Intentionally, the release was delayed until November 28 so that the individual had the option to appeal her decision. The judge said that in the court’s view, there is no reason to redact Doe 183 from the documents. Another pile of documents was also ordered to be unsealed by Preska, relating to Doe 147, who was named to be Epstein victim Sarah Ransom.
Ransome already publicly testified in another case, said Preska, and confirmed Preska that Ransome was a s-xual abuse victim. A book about further details of her experiences was also published by Ransome, and she wrote a Washington Post op-ed with some relevant details.
In Maxwell’s own trial last year, some other information in the documents was already made available, the judge said. These documents resulted in Maxwell’s 20-year conviction. But some of the documents were kept under seal by the judge, however, agreeing to some “sufficient interest to preserve sealing.”
The judge said that as they were not a contributor of the abuse or a victim of Epstein or Maxwell, another individual, named Doe 12 in the documents, remained sealed. It was also ordered by judge Preska for the documents relating to Doe 28 to remain sealed. The judge also said that the individual is a “victim of s-xual assault who continues to experience trauma as a result of these events.”
The release of the documents has been requested by the Media organizations, which are from a 2016 defamation case against Maxwell by accuser Virginia Roberts Giuffre, which was settled later. Collections of documents have been released on a regular schedule, since the settlement, first starting days after Epstein’s death in 2019.
