Epstein ex Maxwell isolated after prison staffer gets virus

NEW YORK — Ghislaine Maxwell, the one-time girlfriend of Jeffrey Epstein, is in quarantine at a New York City federal lockup after a staff member there tested positive for the coronavirus, prosecutors said Monday.

In a letter to a judge, prosecutors said Maxwell, 58, was put in isolation last Wednesday as a precaution even though she tested negative. The staff member who tested positive works in the area of the Brooklyn jail where Maxwell is housed, prosecutors said.

They said Maxwell is not exhibiting symptoms and will be tested again at the conclusion of the two-week quarantine.

The government said she will not be able to meet with her lawyers during quarantine as she prepares for a July trial on charges alleging she recruited three teenage girls for Epstein to abuse in the 1990s. But she will be able to continue to review trial materials 13 hours a day, more than any other inmate, prosecutors wrote.

Maxwell has been held without bail since her July arrest. Epstein died by suicide in a Manhattan federal lockup in August 2019 as he awaited a sex trafficking trial.

An email message seeking comment was sent to Maxwell’s lawyers.

The Associated Press