Maxwell Juror Says Failure To Disclose Abuse Was 'Inadvertent Mistake'

A juror in Ghislaine Maxwell's sex abuse trial said on Tuesday that his failure to disclose that he had been sexually abused as a child on a pre-trial screening form was an "inadvertent mistake."

Maxwell was convicted on Dec. 29 on five of the six counts she faced for helping the late financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse underage girls.

Her lawyers demanded a new trial after Juror No. 50 told media including Reuters that he shared with other jurors his history of sexual abuse during deliberations. He said in the pre-trial screening questionnaire that he had not been sexually abused.

U.S. District Judge Alison Nathan said the juror's statements provided evidence that he responded falsely on the questionnaire, and questioned the juror about his responses in a Tuesday hearing in Manhattan federal court.

"This is one of the biggest mistakes I've ever made in my life," Juror No. 50, who testified without revealing his name, said in court.

He testified that he had been abused by a stepbrother and the stepbrother's friend when he was 9 and 10 years old. He said that looking back on the question, he should have answered "yes" to the question on whether he had ever been abused, but that his history of abuse did not bias him.

"I flew through this questionnaire," Juror No. 50 testified. "This is a terrible excuse, but I really didn't think I'd be chosen."

Nathan granted the juror immunity after his lawyer said the juror would invoke his constitutional right to avoid self-incrimination and decline to answer questions at the hearing. The juror signed the form under penalty of perjury, meaning he could have faced legal consequences if he lied.

The juror told Reuters he did not recall how he filled out the form, but would have answered honestly.

Maxwell, 60, faces up to 65 years in prison. Epstein died by suicide in 2019 at the age of 66 in a Manhattan jail cell while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges