Ghislaine Maxwell juror says evidence convinced panel she was a ‘predator’

A juror in the Ghislaine Maxwell trial has revealed how the jury viewed her as a ‘predator’ and claimed that she ‘might have seemed more human’ if she had taken the stand in her own defense.

Maxwell was sentenced to five years imprisonment for sex-trafficking. Maxwell was also convicted of Scotty David.

Now, speaking to DailyMail.com, he has recalled how he ‘locked eyes’ with Maxwell in court, admitted that he felt sympathy for the woman about whom he knew nothing before the trial and revealed the tensions and frustrations through which the jury worked across five days of intense deliberations.

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Scotty, who spoke on condition that only his first and middle names are used, said he went into the trial firmly believing that Maxwell was ‘innocent until proven guilty’ and viewing the victims with a skeptical eye

Scotty was in finance and sat in the corner of the Jury Box in the third row. From his vantage point, he said, he had a vista of the entire court and the ‘perfect view’ of Maxwell herself

According to Scotty, who spoke on condition that only his first and middle names are used, he went into the trial firmly believing that Maxwell was ‘innocent until proven guilty’ and viewing the victims with a skeptical eye.

But, he said, ‘After all I’ve learned, she’s just as guilty as Epstein. I don’t want to call her a monster, but a predator is the right word.  

‘She knew what was happening. It was clear to her that Epstein was doing it and she let it happen. So that Epstein could be with the girls, she helped to make them feel comfortable.

‘And, to me, them returning repeatedly for the money has nothing to do with anything because these girls were minors, and it doesn’t matter what incentivized them. It matters what happened to them.’

Scotty (a finance worker) was sitting in the middle of the second row. From his vantage point, he said, he had a vista of the entire court and the ‘perfect view’ of Maxwell herself.

He recalled, ‘I could literally see her [all the time]. There were times when it felt like she was staring right at me and we would lock eyes…it didn’t feel real.’

Scotty recalled looking directly at Maxwell, ‘I could literally see her [all the time]. There were times when it felt like she was staring right at me and we would lock eyes…it didn’t feel real’

Scotty is completely satisfied that they reached the right verdict and that, with Maxwell’s conviction, justice has been done. He believes that she will be in prison for the rest of her lives if there isn’t a compromise.

Scotty said that Maxwell’s manner in court was discussed during deliberations. He said, ‘We did discuss that we thought she was a little standoffish and not necessarily cold, more like she was paying attention’

‘She was constantly taking notes, and constantly passing post-it notes over to her attorneys especially when they were on cross examination.’

At times, he said, ‘I felt like she was watching what we were doing because there were times when some jurors, not during when the victims presented their testimony, but when certain other people presented on things that maybe they didn’t feel mattered…some people would nod off.’

Scotty said that Maxwell’s manner in court was discussed during deliberations. He said, ‘We did discuss that we thought she was a little standoffish and not necessarily cold, more like she was paying attention.’

In an insight that will surely come as a gut blow to Maxwell herself, who reportedly wanted to testify but was advised against it, Scotty revealed that if she had taken the stand, ‘It would have shown maybe that she was a little more human.

‘Maybe if she gave her version of the story, who knows, maybe if she gave us a story of how she was manipulated…I don’t know. But then that would have been an admission I feel like of guilt.’

Jurors were instructed not to draw any inference of guilt or otherwise from Maxwell’s decision not to testify and, Scotty said, it was simply set to one side and not discussed during deliberations.

Asked if, at any stage, he had experienced any sympathy for Maxwell he said, ‘Absolutely. This is her entire life. Based on the evidence, we decided what would happen.

‘We took that very seriously because we took at as, this could be our sister, our sister could be on trial here. We have to really comb through the evidence and make sure we have enough proof to say that she’s either guilty or not.’

After a lengthy trial with detailed testimony and long statements from victims, the jury received a staggering 80-page set of instructions. There were six charges to be considered.

Scotty admits that at first jurors had difficulty figuring out where or how to proceed.

He claimed that there was no initial vote, and instead they simply selected a person to lead them through each page.

He said, ‘It was overwhelming. I mean 80 pages of how you interpret the law on each count, and it flips back and forth between different pages, and you have to flip 20 pages in order to get a definition of something else that can apply to one specific count.’

Maxwell, pictured together with Epstein, was charged in relation to six charges of sextrafficking. These were based on stories from four victims

Scotty said that Maxwell was not innocent and that Maxwell’s story did not hinder his view of Maxwell until he was proven guilty.

Maxwell was charged with six charges related to sextrafficking. These were based on stories from four victims.

Kate, a fifth victim was called in only to indicate a pattern for grooming and was not directly involved in any of these counts.

At first jurors struggled to agree, Scotty said, over the legal definitions of terms such as ‘enticing.’

He said, ‘It was super confusing. It didn’t get heated. This was just confusing. People can become confused and raise their voices. People never yelled at others. People used to just talk, sometimes sounding annoyed.

‘So, we [realized] we had to come up with a new game plan and that game plan was, we’re going to talk to each other with compassion.’

That sea-change came, Scotty said, when he chose to share his own experience of sexual abuse with the room which, he recalled, ‘went silent’ when he did.

Maxwell may have been able to use the fact that a juror had suffered sexual abuse as an argument for his appeal.

Each juror had to complete a 50-question questionnaire before they could be selected.

DailyMail.com asked Scotty if he could recall that question. However, he said a certain thing: ‘I have answered all of my questions truthfully.

He said that Maxwell’s story was not unique and that Maxwell could still be considered innocent until he is proven guilty.

He believes it gave him a greater understanding of the victims’ testimony.

To that end, he said, the defense’s tactic of ‘going hard’ on the victims did not play well with him or other jurors.

Scotty pointed to defense attorney Laura Menninger’s use of air-quotes when questioning Jane about her story of ‘escaping’ Epstein at one point.

He said, ‘Everything, her tone, using air-quotes with escape…I think she was acting in order to convince us that this girl’s lying and lying for money.’

He said that it only convinced jurors the defense team had shown a total lack of respect for victims.

He said, ‘I just felt terrible I’m like, “I can’t believe you’re treating this woman like this.” Like even if she’s lying there’s better ways to go about it…I don’t feel attacking them that way or degrading her based on what she said was the way to go.’

According to Scotty once the jurors had found a way to ‘understand’ each other they worked methodically through each count starting with count 2.

This was the only charge on which they did not convict Maxwell and related to the charge of ‘enticing’ Jane to travel for sexual exploitation.

Seven jurors voted guilty, and five voted not guilty in the initial vote. Those ‘not guilty’ votes turned to ‘not sure’ on further discussion. Ultimately, he said, it was not a question of Jane’s credibility but rather the fact that they simply did not feel the evidence was there to meet the necessary bar of beyond reasonable doubt.

As they worked through every charge, jurors created evidence lists on a whiteboard and added post-it notes. They then built each case as they saw it. Finally they reached consensus.

On counts two and four – both relating to Jane – there was a 7/5 split of guilty/not sure. On counts one, three and five – all conspiracy charges – there was a 10/2 guilty/not sure split and on count six, the sex trafficking charge relating to Carolyn, all voted guilty from the start.

Scotty claimed that Scotty never felt under pressure by either the judge, or any of the jurors in order to reach a decision. He claimed that the judge had sent them a notice on Wednesday 29 Dec informing them she was going to recall them if they didn’t reach a verdict. They were actually about to write her a letter stating they had reached agreement on all the counts.

Today Scotty is completely satisfied that they reached the right verdict and that, with Maxwell’s conviction, justice has been done.

He believes that she will be in prison for the remainder of her life unless there is a compromise. He said that he didn’t know the extent of her sentence and it wouldn’t have affected anything had he known.

He said, ‘It satisfies me to know that we did our due diligence and that we brought justice for these victims, for these girls who are now women.’

He said that, ultimately, he and the rest of the jurors were convinced that Epstein and Maxwell’s lives were so ‘intertwined’ that it was inconceivable that she was not fully aware of his crimes.

He said that she assisted and encouraged. And with her conviction she wasn’t paying or being held accountable for Epstein’s crimes as her attorneys have argued, Scotty said, instead she was answering to her own guilt because she was ‘every bit as culpable’ as he.

According to Scotty, ‘The prosecution proved their case beyond reasonable doubt.’