The judge in British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell’s sex abuse trial said the jury would deliberate for at least one hour longer than usual if needed on Tuesday due to an “astronomical spike” in COVID-19 cases in the New York area.
Maxwell, 60, is accused of recruiting and grooming four teenage girls to have sexual encounters with the late financier Jeffrey Epstein between 1994 and 2004. Over a three-week trial, jurors heard emotional and explicit testimony from the women, three of whom said Maxwell herself touched their nude bodies.
Deliberations in Manhattan federal court began on the afternoon of December 20 and resumed on Monday after a four-day break for Christmas. “We are very simply at a different place regarding the epidemic than we were even a week ago,” she said.Laura Menninger, a defense lawyer, told Nathan on Monday that any suggestion that the jury stay later “is beginning to sound like urging them to hurry up.”“We would object to trying to urge them to stay later if they are not asking to do so and aren’t expressing any difficulty in proceeding with the deliberations that they are currently undertaking,” Menninger said.
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