NEW YORK: Prince Andrew's friend Ghislaine Maxwell has been placed on suicide watch at a Brooklyn prison, and may seek to delay Tuesday's sentencing of Jeffrey Epstein for sexually abusing underage girls, his lawyer said Saturday night. .
In a letter to the judge overseeing Maxwell's case, Maxwell's attorney, Bobby Sternheim, said his client was "unable to properly prepare for sentencing," as Metropolitan Detention Center officials clocked suicide Friday. Announced and suddenly Maxwell was transferred to solitary confinement. ,
Sternheim said Maxwell was given a "suicide smoke" and that his clothes, toothpaste, soap and legal papers were taken away.
The lawyer also said that Maxwell was "not suicidal," she said, adding that a psychologist who evaluated the 60-year-old British socialite on Saturday morning also reached out.
“If Ms. Maxwell remains under observation of suicide, is restricted from reviewing legal material prior to sentencing, becomes sleep-deprived, and is denied sufficient time to meet and be counselled, we may formally Will move to adjournment on Monday," Sternheim wrote.
A spokeswoman for US Attorney Damian Williams in Manhattan, whose office sued Maxwell, declined to comment.
Epstein, 66, killed himself in August 2019 in a Manhattan prison cell where the financier was awaiting trial for sex trafficking.
Maxwell was indicted on December 29 on five criminal counts, including sex trafficking, for framing and abusing four girls for Epstein between 1994 and 2004.
Prosecutors have said Maxwell should spend at least 30 years in prison, citing "lack of remorse". Maxwell wants a tenure of less than 20 years.
The sentence will be handed down by U.S. Circuit Judge Alison Nathan in Manhattan federal court.
Maxwell has been lodged in a Brooklyn prison since shortly after his July 2020 arrest.
His lawyers objected to the prison conditions there several times before the trial, including last November, when Sternheim compared him to Hannibal Lecter in the 1991 Oscar-winning film "The Silence of the Lambs."
The Maxwell circle included Britain's Prince Andrew, former US President and real estate baron Donald Trump, and the Clinton family. (web desk/Reuters)