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Case 1:20-cr-00330-PAE Document 663 Filed 06/15/22 Page6of77 government added to the demonization of Ms. Maxwell by calling her a “villain” on the day of her arrest.* But in sentencing Ms. Maxwell, the Court cannot be influenced by this inexorable drumbeat of public condemnation calling for her to be locked away for good. The Court cannot heal the wounds caused by Epstein by heaping on Ms. Maxwell’s shoulders the pain of every one of his victims, the outrage of society, the public scorn of the community, and then driving her out of the community forever. While that may assuage the public and give the perception that “justice was done,” that is not justice. That is scapegoating. Ms. Maxwell must be sentenced on the record before the Court and not these external pressures. Ghislaine Maxwell’s Arrest and Detention At dawn on July 2, 2020, a team of more than a dozen FBI agents arrested Ms. Maxwell at the New Hampshire home where she had taken refuge after Epstein’s death to escape the upsurge of highly intrusive media coverage that had engulfed her and her family. She had relocated alone, separating from her family to safeguard her husband and two young stepchildren and to secure the personal safety of her family and herself. At that time, Ms. Maxwell was the target of numerous death threats and threats of violence and was being hunted by the press. One media outlet even offered a $10,000 bounty for information about her whereabouts. Tragically, this experience was not new for Ms. Maxwell. Decades earlier, when Ms. Maxwell was just a child and her father was a Member of Parliament, U.K. authorities found a “hit list” of potential kidnapping/assassination targets in a safehouse used by the Irish Republican Army. Ms. Maxwell’s name was first on the list. This unnerving experience has haunted her, heightening her vigilance and concerns about the welfare and safety of her young stepchildren, who were being hounded by the media at school and * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7J4ReLHvag, at 2:09-2:15. DOJ-OGR-00010452