A federal court judge Wednesday night began the release of the names of about 150 affiliates of sex traffickers Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, the result of a long legal battle waged by the Miami Herald and its parent company, McClatchy.

Judge Loretta Preska issued an order Wednesday afternoon, reiterating an earlier pledge that the documents would be unsealed, even though two unidentified people had appealed her decision. One “Doe,” as in John or Jane Doe, was given a stay until Jan. 22, the other, Doe 110, will be reviewed in due course, the judge said.

Release of the sealed court documents — a highly anticipated list of those in the sex trafficker’s orbit— could finally bring to rest years of speculation about who among the rich and powerful were participants in the Palm Beach resident’s sordid world of sexual abuse.

Epstein, 66, died in August 2019. Found hanging inside a prison cell, Epstein’s death was ruled a suicide. His accomplice, Maxwell, 62, is serving a 20-year federal prison sentence in Tallahassee. To date, they were the only people prosecuted in the case, though many influential people are believed to have known about or even participated in their crimes.

Release of the documents capped a five-year court case filed by the Herald in 2019 through its attorneys at Holland & Knight to unseal documents that had been sealed by a prior judge who handled the case. The bulk of the material was unsealed on Aug. 9, 2019 — one day before Epstein was found dead. Since then the documents have been released on a rolling basis, as the judge allowed many of the names in the lawsuit to appeal the unsealing. As as result, it has taken years for the case to come this far. The judge did allow for the names of victims to remain sealed.

Three other Does — who are not victims — were also allowed to remain sealed. The Herald intends to appeal that decision.

Preska in mid-December ordered the unsealing, allowing a 14-day window for appeals. The window expired at the end of December.

In so ruling, Preska agreed with the Herald that the documents should be made public. The documents were generated in the course of litigating a defamation lawsuit filed against Epstein accomplice Maxwell by victim Virginia Giuffre.

Giuffre’s lawsuit was settled out of court in 2016, but much of the evidence remained sealed.

Epstein, who had expensive homes in Manhattan, New Mexico and the U.S. Virgin Islands in addition to Palm Beach, sexually abused more than 100 young women and girls from 2002 to 2018. He’d largely evaded legal consequence, until the summer of 2019, after a Herald investigative series, “Perversion of Justice,” brought attention new to his case — and led ultimately to his arrest.

The names in the documents are those of recruiters, associates and “affiliates” of Epstein and Maxwell.

Preska’s ruling allows three people to remain publicly unidentified. Two of them — J. Does 58 and 124 — are “classic outsiders peripheral to the events at issue” who are not associated with Epstein and Maxwell, according to the judge’s ruling. A third, Doe 133, was mistakenly identified in a photo, according to the judge, who noted that Doe was characterized as “an alleged perpetrator” by a reporter. The judge did not further elaborate on her decision.

Thirteen others tried unsuccessfully to keep their names hidden. Among them: Leslie Wexner, the former CEO of the Limited and Victoria’s Secret.

Other names expected to be in the documents include Prince Andrew, financier Glenn Dubin and modeling agent Jean Luc Brunel, a onetime South Beach bon vivant who died by suicide in a French prison; and people who worked as butlers, housekeepers or recruiters for Epstein.

_____

©2024 Miami Herald. Visit at miamiherald.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.