The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus pandemic has topped 156,000 as the number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 soared in July by nearly 50%. There are now over 5 million confirmed cases in the US with California, Florida and Texas each reaching over 500,000 confirmed cases, nearly double the cases reported in New York City, the former leading epicenter of the pandemic in the US. Nearly half of the US confirmed cases have recovered.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said that a significant number of COVID-19 patients do not recover quickly, and instead experience ongoing symptoms, such as fatigue and cough. Eight months into the global pandemic, we’re still measuring its effects only in deaths. Non-hospitalized cases are termed ‘mild’ and are largely not followed up. Recovery is implied by discharge from hospital or testing negative for the virus so ongoing ill health in those classed as ‘recovered’ is going largely unmeasured as the focused has mainly been on slowing the infection rate.
Research that follows COVID patients after discharge from hospital is starting but there is still a gap in quantifying and characterizing COVID-related illness in those not hospitalized. The few studies on those who have recovered indicate that previously healthy people with persistent symptoms such as chest heaviness, breathlessness, muscle pains, palpitations and fatigue, which prevent them from resuming work or physical or caring activities, are still classed under the umbrella of ‘mild COVID’. As many as a third of patients who were never sick enough to be hospitalized are not back to their usual health up to three weeks after their diagnosis. Many with long-term symptoms are otherwise young and healthy. Among those surveyed between ages 18 and 34, about 20 percent experienced lasting symptoms.
Among the patients who experienced lasting symptoms in a CDC report, 71 percent reported fatigue, 61 percent had lasting cough, and 61 percent reported ongoing headaches. Although clinicians and researchers have an idea of who is at increased risk of dying from COVID, we don’t know who is more likely to experience prolonged ill health following symptomatic, or even asymptomatic, infection. The CDC still states that preventative measures, such as physical distancing, face masks and frequent hand-washing, continue to be important to slow the spread of COVID-19. They warn that worldwide, millions of those still alive who got ill without being tested or hospitalized are simply not being counted.
The World Health Organization reports cases are now doubling every six weeks. The United States, Brazil, and the United Kingdom have been among the countries hardest hit by the pandemic. The global death toll from the coronavirus has surpassed 700,000, with nearly 19 million confirmed cases, as the pandemic continues to accelerate. During the month of July, more than 8 million people tested positive — almost as many as in the first six months of the pandemic combined. Nearly 12 million of those confirmed cases have recovered.
The top White House coronavirus adviser Deborah Birx has warned the country has entered a new phase in its fight against the pandemic. A new model by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation suggests the U.S. coronavirus death toll is on pace to reach nearly 300,000 by December. The institute projects 66,000 lives could be saved if 95% of people in the United States wear face coverings. The U.S. death toll currently stands at the highest total in the world.
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Black Lives Matter protests continue into their third month in many cities across the US as federal agents drew down their presence in Portland, Oregon last week after a widely condemned violent crackdown on the demonstrators. For weeks, Portland activists have protested racial inequities in the criminal justice system. The Portland police chief stepped down and the Portland City Council slashed the police budget by millions. The Multnomah County district attorney stepped down five months early to make room for his reform-minded successor. The governor also called a special legislative session to address demands for police accountability.
Portland police and city leaders openly struggled with how to respond to nightly havoc wrought by a smaller core of demonstrators. The White House sent federal marshals to Portland to quell the protests. As the number of videos of excessive force used by federal marshals against peaceful protestors began to circulate on social media, so did the size of the protests. Tensions escalated after an officer with the Marshals Service fired a less-lethal round at protester Donavan La Bella’s head on July 11, critically injuring him.
Videos of La Bella’s assault and others prompted the Wall of Moms, a group of approximately 40 women, some pregnant, who first attended the protests in Portland to help protect protestors from the violence they had seen in their own city. Now, the Wall of Moms has grown to over 14,000 and they have popped up at protests in Boston, Chicago, Washington DC and many other cities across the US.
When videos out of Portland began circulating showing the Wall of Moms being sprayed in the face with tear gas while standing with arms interlocked in front of protestors, the Wall of Dads emerged, armed with leaf blowers to blow the tear gas away. The violence continued and video of navy veteran Christopher David emerged, showing him being pepper sprayed and repeatedly struck with a baton by a marshal when he walked up to them to ask a question. David suffered a fractured hand that will require surgery.
Within a week of David’s assault going viral, a new wall, the Wall of Veterans joined the frontlines in Portland to curb the violence by federal marshals. Their numbers swelled and they were soon joined by other burgeoning groups — green-shirted Teachers Against Tyrants, the pizza-box carrying ChefBloc, the Wall of Nurses, health-care workers in scrubs and Lawyers for Black Lives, who turned up at the protest in suits and ties.
Michelle Heisler, the medical director of Physicians for Human Rights said that typically, police fire the tear gas or pepper spray agent once or twice to clear crowds and encourage people to move away from an area, but in Portland, federal agents have been unleashing the chemicals repeatedly for hours. This sustained cascade makes it difficult for peaceful demonstrators to avoid being hit and runs the risk of ensnaring bystanders in the area.
The Marshal Service has acknowledged only the two instances of excessive force that were caught on video and are currently under internal review by the agency involving La Bella and David. Marshals and other law enforcement agencies have been criticized for their use of tear gas and other irritants on protestors. A representative for the Marshal service said they are defending themselves against coordinated attacks by a smaller group of organized protestors that stay behind after the peaceful protestors leave.
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Housing activists across the country are demanding local protections against evictions during the pandemic. Many states have faced criticism for resuming evictions as millions of people are still out of work, many who still have children at home until the school year starts. Many companies have closed their doors indefinitely, taking jobs with them across the US. While some states and counties issued eviction moratoriums, they have expired and thousands face homelessness.
In New Orleans, members of the Renters Rights Assembly surrounded a courthouse that handles evictions, chaining themselves together under a banner reading “Evictions = Death,” and blocking several landlords from entering the building. In Maryland, more than 100 protesters marched through Mayor Tom Barrett’s neighborhood demanding a moratorium on evictions and other forms of housing protections. Beyond standard legal protections, tenants in Maryland have an extra layer of protection against eviction during the pandemic: an executive order from Governor Larry Hogan prohibits eviction so long as the state remains under the state of emergency — and so long as the tenants can prove that their income has been significantly impacted by COVID-19. A second layer of protection, a pause on eviction-related hearings in Maryland courts, expired on July 25.
In Missouri, protests brought proceedings to a halt at a Kansas City eviction court. All spring KC Tenants demanded relief for Kansas City renters left vulnerable by the coronavirus pandemic. They organized — virtually and in person — to shut down the state eviction court proceedings at the Jackson County Courthouse. KC Tenants leaders pledged to keep shutting down the eviction docket until they see action to protect vulnerable residents. “If our so-called leaders continue to lead our tenants into death digitally, online, via phone or even in person, we are going to continue to shut it down until we get what we want,” Mason Andrew Kilpatrick said in front of the courthouse. In St. Louis, protestors gather outside city hall for an “anti-eviction rally” heavily criticizing the court’s decision to restart evictions. “People aren’t working. People don’t have money,” said Sarah Watkins, a rally organizer with Action STL. “People haven’t paid rent since the pandemic began in April. People will be on the street.”
In Milwaukee, a march was organized by the Milwaukee Autonomous Tenants Union to demand help for the many families still out of work due to the coronavirus pandemic. Gov. Tony Evers’ statewide ban on evictions expired two months ago and now, between 150 and 170 people are being evicted from their homes in Milwaukee every week. The state ($25 million), Milwaukee County ($10 million) and City of Milwaukee ($15 million) have poured millions into rental assistance programs, but advocates say vulnerable tenants need added protections. “The rental assistance is good, but it’s not enough,” said protest organizer Robert Penner. “It’s very slow, the systems are backlogged, and they’re over-saturated with cases. A lot of people lose their home before they can even get in contact” with such programs, he said.
Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner announced a second round of $15 million in rental assistance for people financially struggling during the COVID-19 recession Friday, one day after he declined to support a city-mandated eviction grace period for tenants to catch up on past-due payments. More than 3 million Texans have applied for unemployment benefits since the pandemic began. They have also relied on federal benefits from a congressional pandemic relief package, eviction moratoriums and rent assistance programs to remain housed.
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Coronavirus cases continue to surge in much of the United States, where the number of confirmed infections has topped 4.6 million, with nearly 155,000 reported deaths. Florida has surpassed New York to become the state with the second-highest number of infections after California. Almost 66,000 new COVID-19 cases and more than 1,400 deaths from the virus were reported in the U.S. on July 29th, 2020. The toll marks the highest number of deaths from COVID-19 in a single day since May 15. A total of 773 of those deaths were reported by coronavirus hot-spot states Arizona, California, Florida and Texas. Florida reported a state record of 216 coronavirus-related deaths in 24 hours.
In California, healthcare providers say they are again dealing with shortages in testing, which is hitting low-income and immigrant communities the hardest. In Texas, doctors at a rural hospital in Starr County have received critical care guidelines to help them decide which COVID-19 patients the hospital can treat and those whom they send home because they are more likely to die. With the virus continuing to spread out of control, researchers at Johns Hopkins University are calling for a “reset” in the U.S. coronavirus response with universal mask mandates, federal support for expanded testing and a new round of stay-at-home orders in hot spots. And in an open letter published Wednesday, the Association of American Medical Colleges writes, “If the nation does not change its course — and soon — deaths in the United States could be well into the multiple hundreds of thousands.”
Globally, coronavirus cases have now topped 16.2 million and over 650,000 have died since the first cluster of cases were reported in late December 2019 in Wuhan China. Last week, the worldwide caseload jumped by 1 million in just four days. The World Health Organization declared the outbreak the most severe global health emergency the WHO has ever faced.
As European nations scramble to prevent a second wave of infections, Britain has reinstated a 14-day quarantine for travelers coming from Spain. Globally, 11 million people have recovered. For those who survive COVID-19, there’s increasing evidence of long-term organ damage with more studies underway. A new study published by the Journal of the American Medical Association found that of 100 middle-aged patients who recovered from COVID-19, 78 had structural damage to their hearts.
One study group in Italy found that 87% of patients hospitalized for acute COVID-19 were still struggling 2 months later. Data from the COVID Symptom Study, which uses an app into which millions of people in the United States, United Kingdom, and Sweden have entered their symptoms, suggest 10% to 15% of people—including some “mild” cases—don’t quickly recover. But with the crisis just months old, no one knows how far into the future symptoms will endure, and whether COVID-19 will prompt the onset of chronic diseases.
Distinct features of the virus, including its propensity to cause widespread inflammation and blood clotting, could play a role in the assortment of concerns now surfacing. Survivor studies are just starting to probe them. Researchers across the United Kingdom have launched a study that will follow 10,000 survivors for 1 year to start, and up to 25 years. Ultimately, researchers hope to understand the disease’s long shadow and hopefully be able to predict who’s at highest risk of lingering symptoms and learn whether treatments in the acute phase of illness can head them off.
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The son of a federal judge in New Jersey has died after a gunman opened fire on their home in North Brunswick. Judge Esther Salas was unharmed in the shooting that killed her 20-year-old son Daniel Anderl and critically injured her husband. Roy Den Hollander, a self-proclaimed anti-feminist lawyer, is the primary suspect in the fatal shooting that took place at Salas’ New Jersey home a Sunday evening. Daniel Salas, who had just turned 20, was an only child and studying law to follow in his parents’ footsteps. He graduated cum laude with honors from St. Joseph’s High School in 2018 and was enrolled at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.
Hollander allegedly posed as a FedEx employee when he approached Salas’ home and shot her husband, Mark Anderl, and her son, Daniel Anderl, 20, before escaping in a car, according to sources. Daniel Anderl died from his injuries, and Mark Anderl was critically injured and rushed to the hospital. Salas was unharmed. Hollander was found dead by police in an apparent suicide the next day, according to investigators.
Preliminary indications are that the husband answered the door and was shot multiple times; the son came running to the door and was shot as well before the gunman fled, the sources said. Judge Salas was believed to be in the basement at the time of the shooting, and she was not injured. Hollander was found dead of an apparent suicide the day after the shooting.
The only interaction Hollander and Salas had was a civil rights lawsuit filed in 2019. A female teenager sued the Selective Service System five years ago because she could not register for the male-only draft. In her most recent opinion on the case, filed in spring 2019, Salas sided with part of the plaintiff’s argument, allowing the lawsuit to move forward. The plaintiff’s attorney at the time was Roy Den Hollander. That civil rights suit appears to be the only time Hollander argued before Salas in court. Hollander was replaced last June as the female plaintiff’s lawyer in the lawsuit. A managing partner for Boies Schiller Flexner said that Hollander asked the law firm to take over the case because he was terminally ill. In Hollander’s autobiography published on his personal website, he wrote that he was diagnosed with melanoma in 2018.
County officials in California say they received additional evidence connecting Hollander to another killing. San Bernardino County authorities released new images that captured Roy Den Hollander inside two California train stations in early July around the days he’s suspected of killing Marc Angelucci. Investigators believe Hollander left New York on July 4th and arrived in at the San Bernardino train station on July 7. A second photo from inside Union Station in Los Angeles supports the claims by authorities that Den Hollander fled back to New York on July 14, three days after he drove a rental car to Angelucci’s house in Cedar Pines Park and shot him.
Officials believe Den Hollander used the same gun in both of killing of Angelucci on July 11 and the shooting of Judge Esther Salas’ son and husband in New Brunswick, New Jersey. According to sources, officials are investigating whether the attacks were grudge killings committed by Hollander after he knew he was dying.
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In the US, Covid 19 has killed nearly 141,000 people and infected 3.8 million — both by far the highest numbers in the world. The US has more than a quarter of the deaths and infections in the entire world, yet only a little more than 4% of the population. As cases continue to spike, tensions spike over schools reopening. As schools across the country prepare to reopen for in-classroom learning, teachers are trying to figure out the safest way to resume in-person education. While some schools have given the option for online courses, others are still working on plans to return to the classroom. Lawmakers in Washington are pushing to include a provision in a new coronavirus relief package tying school funding to the reopening of classrooms. Many public health officials fear the reopening of schools could lead to a new surge in COVID-19 deaths and hospitalizations.
Three teachers in Arizona were sharing a classroom for two hours a day teaching online summer school classes during the pandemic. Despite following protocols — social distancing, wearing masks and gloves, and using hand sanitizer — they were all sickened by the coronavirus. Kimberley Chavez Lopez Byrd, 61, died June 26, less than two weeks after she was hospitalized. The two surviving teachers, Jena Martinez and Angela Skillings, said that it is not yet safe for kids, or teachers, to return to the classroom. Martinez said that when they began to do their online schooling from campus, they followed plans in place meant to keep them safe from the virus.
In Arizona, teachers want Governor Doug Ducey to push the start of in-person school to at least early October after the beloved educator died of COVID-19 teaching summer school and statewide hospitalizations and deaths spiral. At stake, Arizona teachers say, is the safety of the state’s 1.1 million public school students and 20,000 teachers. Arizona has been hit hard by the virus this summer as its 7-day average of new cases has gone from 500 at the end of May to more than 3,000 in July, while hospitals’ intensive care capacity, according to most recent data from Arizona Department of Public Health, stood at a nearly 90% percent last week.
Florida has reported more than 10,000 new coronavirus cases for the sixth day in a row. On Monday, Florida’s largest teachers’ union sued Republican Governor Ron DeSantis to block his order requiring all schools to reopen next month despite the growing pandemic, which has killed nearly 5,200 Floridians.
Meanwhile, Missouri Governor Mike Parson is insisting students go to school despite the risk of the virus. He received backlash after giving an interview where he said “These kids have got to get back to school. They’re at the lowest risk possible. And if they do get COVID-19, which they will — and they will when they go to school — they’re not going to the hospitals. They’re not going to have to sit in doctor’s offices. They’re going to go home and they’re going to get over it. We gotta move on,” he continued. “We can’t just let this thing stop us in our tracks.” Many criticized his statement calling it “stunning ignorance” saying the virus “doesn’t stop with our children. The teachers, bus drivers, janitors, food service workers, parents, grandparents and neighbors who our children see every day are susceptible to this virus, too. We need a plan that keeps all Missouri families safe.” Missouri has 47,519 confirmed cases and 1,268 deaths.
It is still unclear how frequently children transmit the virus to others. Some data suggests children are less susceptible to contracting the virus and spreading it to adults. According to the CDC, 175,374 cases have been confirmed in kids ages 17 and under, accounting for approximately 6% of all confirmed cases. A large study recently shared out of South Korea found children between the ages of 10 and 19 can spread the virus as much as adults do, while children younger than the age of 10 transmit the virus to others less often than adults.
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Two Indiana men were charged in an alleged assault against a Black man who was seen in a viral video being held against his will in the woods near an Indiana lake on the Fourth of July. Sean Purdy and Jerry Cox are charged with various crimes, including confinement and battery against 36-year-old Vauhxx Booker. Purdy and Cox were part of a group of five men who pinned Booker to a tree, beat him and threatened to lynch him. Booker was able to escape them after passersby intervened. A portion of the assault was captured on video by the strangers who intervened.
Monroe County Prosecutor Erika Oliphant has filed two active warrants for the two men and says Booker will face no charges. Purdy is charged with criminal confinement, battery resulting in injury and intimidation, all felonies. Cox is charged with aiding or causing criminal confinement, felony battery resulting in injury, intimidation and two misdemeanor counts of battery.
Booker, a member of the Monroe County Human Rights Commission, posted his account of the July 4 incident along with video to his Facebook account, writing, “I don’t want to recount this, but I was almost the victim of an attempted lynching.” He went on: “On July 4th evening others and me were victims of what I would describe as a hate crime. I was attacked by five white men with Confederate flags who literally threatened to lynch me in front of numerous witnesses.”
Booker said he and his friends were visiting a public beach on Lake Monroe outside Bloomington to join a gathering when a group of white men said they were on private property and began following them. Some of the men became belligerent, he said. When he approached “sober seeming group members” to “see if we could smooth things over a bit,” the confrontation escalated. Video posted to social media shows a group of white men holding Booker to a tree as his friends plead with them to release him. In the video, one man shouts at the camera, “You happy about this, you nappy-headed bitch? You and your five white friends?” As Booker’s friends leave, one of the men follows, shouting, “Those Black boys want to start it all.”
Booker says during the attack there were shouts of “get a noose” and “white power,” although those are not heard on the video. Booker believes he’s alive because strangers stopped to help and film the altercation. “The reason why I’m here today is simply because these folks, they didn’t just stop and watch and film my execution,” Booker said in an interview with NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly. “They became involved. They became active participants. They put themselves in danger when they stepped forward for me.”
Last week, the FBI confirmed it was investigating the incident as a potential hate crime, and Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb called it “beyond disturbing.” “The brief video clip that I viewed with my own two eyes was beyond disturbing and that’s why it’s very important that the DNR … complete their investigation sooner rather than later.” Bloomington
Mayor Greg Hamilton, who said he has known Booker personally for at least five years, said his city had work to do. “I don’t know what would have happened in the woods around Lake Monroe if there hadn’t been other individuals there and if there hadn’t been a video taken,” Hamilton told Yahoo News. “It’s incredibly important that we as a country, and then me and my community, that we make clear that has no place in our community, and we want to root it out.”
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More than a year after launching an internal investigation into 138 employees for “inappropriate social media activity,” Customs and Border Protection — the parent agency of the Border Patrol — has removed four employees, suspended 38 without pay and disciplined an additional 27 with reprimands or counseling. Investigators from Customs and Border Protection‘s Office of Professional Responsibility determined that 63 of the cases — roughly half — were “unsubstantiated.” Six cases remain open, and the Homeland Security Department‘s inspector general is also investigating.
The office began looking into more than 60 current employees and eight former staff following reports of a secret Facebook group in which members used dehumanizing and derogatory language regarding Latina members of Congress and deceased migrants. The existence of the group, known as “I’m 10-15,” the code used by Border Patrol for migrants in custody, at one point had 9,500 members and was created in August 2016. The probe, which is not criminal, ultimately doubled the number of individuals under investigation, and included several additional private social media groups.
Most of the cases deemed unsubstantiated involved personnel who reported themselves or others as part of the groups and provided information to investigators, but whose history showed they’d never posted or been active in them. At the start of the investigation, Matthew Klein, assistant commissioner of the agency’s Office of Professional Responsibility, emphasized that the privacy of the social media groups does not protect current or former employees from disciplinary action.
Members of the secret Facebook group for current and former Border Patrol agents joked about the deaths of migrants and discussed throwing burritos at Latino members of Congress visiting a detention facility while referring to them as scum buckets. In one post, a photoshopped image depicted Congressmember Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez being sexually assaulted by President Trump. In another thread, members of the group made fun of a video of an immigrant man trying to carry a child through a raging river in a plastic bag. One group member commented, “At least it’s already in a trash bag.”
In one exchange, group members responded with indifference and wisecracks to the post of a news story about a 16-year-old Guatemalan migrant who died in May while in custody at a Border Patrol station in Weslaco, Texas. One member posted a GIF of Elmo with the quote, “Oh well.” Another responded with an image and the words “If he dies, he dies.”
Rep. Veronica Escobar, who said on Twitter she was “one of the Latina members of Congress targeted by the hateful attacks,” but she had not received information about the investigation from Customs and Border Protection. Rep. Joaquín Castro, the head of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, reviewed the Facebook discussions and was incensed. “It confirms some of the worst criticisms of Customs and Border Protection,” said Castro. “These are clearly agents who are desensitized to the point of being dangerous to migrants and their co-workers.” He added that the agents who made the vulgar comments “don’t deserve to wear any uniform representing the United States of America.”
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There have been over 15 million confirmed coronavirus cases around the world with 618,000 deaths. Of those cases 8,500,000 have recovered. In the US there are over 4 million confirmed cases and over 145,000 have died in the 6 months since the first case was confirmed in the US. Almost 8,500,000 of the US cases have recovered. The United States has set another grim record for coronavirus infections, with more than 75,600 new cases confirmed. At least 11 states are reporting record hospitalizations, with nearly 1,000 new deaths in just 24 hours. Officials in Texas and Arizona have put out calls for refrigerated trucks, as morgues overflow with the bodies of COVID-19 patients. Texas and Florida both reported their highest death tolls of the pandemic.
As the number of new global coronavirus cases reaches record highs, the World Health Organization is warning the coronavirus outbreak will continue to worsen if governments don’t take basic public health measures. Reports the number of coronavirus deaths in Latin America has now exceeded the death toll in the United States and Canada. Researchers estimate the US will have 219,864 total Covid-19 deaths by November 1, according to the Institute for Health Metrics at the University of Washington.
In Florida, confirmed coronavirus cases topped 300,000 even as Disney World completed a phased reopening of its Orlando theme parks. Nearly 50 Florida hospitals said they were out of ICU beds. In Miami, hospitals have run out of regular intensive care beds, with new patients moved into converted ICUs. Governor Ron DeSantis said he was mobilizing 1,000 medical workers to fill critical staffing shortages.
California, the most populous state and the first to shut down months ago, appeared to have Covid-19 under control — only to suffer a massive resurgence and surpass New York with the most coronavirus cases in the nation. California, which now has 417,000 confirmed cases due to the recent spikes, is largely shutting down again. California Governor Gavin Newsom has a plan to halt the recent surge by ordering all indoor restaurants, wineries, movie theaters and museums to be closed again. Bars have been ordered to cease all operations. Indoor businesses have been shuttered in many areas. Newsom said the new shutdowns are needed to address the public health crisis. The Los Angeles and San Diego school districts have announced that all classes will be conducted online at the start of the school year due to the pandemic.
Covid-19 is set to become one of the leading causes of death in Los Angeles County, according to Barbara Ferrer, the county’s health director. “It’s killing more people than Alzheimer’s disease, other kinds of heart disease, stroke and COPD,” Ferrer said. Comparing Covid-19 to the flu, Ferrer said data shows Covid-19 killed twice as many people in six months as the flu did in eight months.
The city of Atlanta announced a similar plan. In New York, Governor Andrew Cuomo said schools will be allowed to reopen, but only in regions with low daily infection rates. At least 41 states have some kind of mask requirement in place or planned. In Colorado, Governor Jared Polis issued a statewide mask mandate, a week after refusing public health officials’ pleas to require facial coverings in public. Arkansas Republican Governor Asa Hutchinson issued a similar mask mandate. The CDC reports that 10 states have reported 10,000 new cases while three states each reported over 60,000 new cases in the last week.
Several vaccine trials are progressing well, and researchers say a vaccine might be publicly available by early 2021. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said any Covid-19 vaccine that’s sponsored by the US government will be free or affordable for the American public.
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The FBI has arrested Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite and heiress who is accused of luring girls to be sexually abused by convicted predator and sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. Maxwell is scheduled to appear in a New York court and could face up to 35 years behind bars. Epstein died from an apparent suicide last August in his jail cell. Maxwell has also previously been accused of sexually assaulting girls with Epstein.
Maxwell, 58, was arrested in Bradford, New Hampshire, on charges she conspired with Epstein to sexually abuse minors. She was found living at a reclusive, million-dollar luxury home with 156 acres of rural mountainside property, federal prosecutors said. In a brief electronic appearance in New Hampshire federal court, a judge remanded her to the custody of the U.S. Marshals and ordered her transferred to New York City. She did not enter a plea, and her attorney indicated he will seek a detention hearing in New York, a prelude to a possible bail request.
The six-count indictment in Manhattan federal court alleges that Maxwell helped Epstein groom girls as young as 14 years old, going back as far as 1994. Prosecutors say she was in the room during — and took part in — the sexual abuse of three underage girls at Epstein’s Upper East Side townhouse, his Florida estate and his ranch in New Mexico. Maxwell was also alleged to have helped Epstein groom teen girls for sex with the rich and powerful. One of those teens, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, leveled that charge against Maxwell in a 2015 defamation suit, as have a number of other women since.
Maxwell has previously denied allegations linking her to Epstein’s exploitation of girls and young women — including denials she made during the sworn testimony for depositions in 2016. The new indictment accuses Maxwell of committing perjury in those depositions.
In the months since Epstein died, federal agents have been discretely keeping an eye on Maxwell during the ongoing investigation. Prosecutors are asking for Maxwell to be held without bail, and also said they are continuing to investigate the case. Maxwell is “an extreme flight risk,” who faces the prospect of serving “many years in prison,” prosecutors said in a court filing. That filing also noted that Maxwell, the daughter of the late crooked media mogul Robert Maxwell, has extensive international connections, citizenship in Britain and France, passports from the U.S., United Kingdom and France, and large sums of money.
The filing stated that Maxwell has 15 different bank accounts, and has made intentional efforts to avoid detection, including moving locations at least twice, switching her primary phone number (which she registered under the name “G Max” and email address, and ordering packages for delivery with a different person listed on the shipping label.” The property she was living in at the time of her arrest was purchased in December by a limited liability corporation that was anonymized to hide the identity of the person or persons behind the purchase, according to prosecutors. The real estate agent who handled the sale for the seller said she was unaware of the buyer’s actual identity because the buyer’s representatives would not disclose it.
Maxwell is the first to be charged in the Epstein investigation besides Epstein himself. Audrey Strauss, the acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, which is prosecuting the case said her office “would welcome” Prince Andrew “coming in and giving us an opportunity to hear his statement” about his relationship with Epstein and Maxwell. Prince Andrew previously has denied a claim by one of Epstein’s victims that he had sex with her at the direction of Maxwell.
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