After Ghislaine Maxwell took up residence in Jeffrey Epstein’s Palm Beach, Fla., mansion, the rules of the house became strict, a former employee of Mr. Epstein’s said on Thursday: See nothing. Hear nothing. Do not look him in the eye.
Testifying on the fourth day of Ms. Maxwell’s sex-trafficking trial, the former employee, Juan Alessi, who worked at the estate from around 1990 to 2002, said he had a “cordial” relationship with Mr. Epstein. But after Ms. Maxwell arrived in the early 1990s, he said, the dynamic changed.
Mr. Alessi said that Ms. Maxwell instructed him on how to speak to Mr. Epstein: “Mr. Epstein doesn’t like to be looked at in his eyes,” Mr. Alessi recalled Ms. Maxwell telling him. “‘Never look at his eyes, look in another part of the room and answer him.’”
The trial, which began on Monday in Federal District Court in Manhattan, is seen by many of his accusers and others as the trial Mr. Epstein never had, and prosecutors have sought to show that Ms. Maxwell, 59, played a pivotal role in her longtime companion’s sexual abuse of teenage girls.
Mr. Epstein, 66, was charged in 2019 with trafficking dozens of girls, some as young as 14, and engaging in sex acts with them. He was arrested in 2019, and killed himself a little more than a month later in a Manhattan jail cell.
Prosecutors have accused Ms. Maxwell of helping Mr. Epstein recruit his victims. She faces six charges, including sex trafficking, enticing and transporting minors for illegal sex act and...
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