By: Ellen Cans

Ghislaine Maxwell, the British socialite and longtime associate of Jeffrey Epstein, is awaiting trial on charges that she facilitated the abuse of teenage girls over two decades ago. She was arrested during the summer, and has since been in Brooklyn’s jail, the Metropolitan Detention Center.

On Monday, Maxwell’s lawyers released a new bail request, in which they propose that she be released from the “intolerable” jail conditions and be put into house arrest at a friend’s home in NYC, with private security guards to keep her from fleeing. The proposal offers $28.5 million as bail, which reflects “all of her and her spouse’s assets, her family’s livelihood, and the financial security of her closest friends and family,” her lawyers wrote.

As reported by the NY Times, Ms. Maxwell, 58, says that her conditions in the jail are “oppressive”. She complains of unceasing and disruptive surveillance and frequent strip searches. She says she has been deprived of food and sleep, and is unable to communicate with her friends and family members.

On Friday, however, federal prosecutors painted a different picture saying Maxwell doesn’t have it so bad in jail. They said she is let out of her cell for 13 hours a day. Her cell is equipped with a private shower, her own phone, a television and exclusive use of two computers. “Those conditions set her far apart from general population inmates, not to mention other inmates in protective custody,” the government wrote in a new court filing opposing Maxwell’s latest bail request.

“Ms. Maxwell vehemently maintains her innocence and is committed to defending herself,” her lawyers wrote in their new bail request, maintaining that she is not a flight risk. “She wants nothing more than to remain in this country to fight the allegations against her.”

As per the Times, prosecutors argue that Ms. Maxwell poses “an extreme flight risk”. Fighting back comments that the evidence against her isn’t even that solid, prosecutors said that they have three witnesses willing to testify about Ms. Maxwell’s role “in Epstein’s criminal scheme to sexually abuse them as minors.” The “evidence confirms that the government’s case remains as strong as it was at the time of the defendant’s arrest,” the government said.

In the event that Ms. Maxwell should be found guilty of the alleged crimes, she faces up to 35 years in prison, prosecutors said.