US: Prosecution rests case in Ghislaine Maxwell trial after fourth accuser testifies

Prosecutors in Ghislaine Maxwell’s sex abuse trial rested their case on Friday after a fourth woman testified that the British socialite set her up for a sexual encounter with the late financier Jeffrey Epstein when she was a teenager.

Maxwell, 59, will now have an opportunity to mount a defence in the trial, which is moving faster than initially expected.

She has pleaded not guilty to eight counts of sex trafficking and other charges. Her lawyers have argued that she is being scapegoated for Epstein’s alleged crimes.

The investor killed himself in a Manhattan jail cell at the age of 66 in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex crimes charges.

On Friday, a woman named Annie Farmer testified that Maxwell touched her breasts while giving her a massage during a visit to Epstein’s New Mexico ranch in 1996, when Farmer was 16. She said Epstein crawled into bed and pressed his body against hers during the trip.

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Jurors previously heard from three women who said Maxwell groomed them for abuse by Epstein, including two who said they were 14 when they began having sexual encounters with them.

• Americas