Prosecutors are trying to ‘break’ Ghislaine Maxwell, claims her brother

Ian Maxwell also said it was designed to “break” a woman targeted by authorities desperate to blame someone for the late financier’s crimes.

Ghislaine Maxwell continues to have the backing of her family, and a family member will be in court at all times to show support, Mr Maxwell said in an interview ahead of the trial, which is set to begin on Monday in the US District Court in Manhattan.

“This is designed to break her, I can’t see any other way to read it,” Mr Maxwell told the Associated Press. “And she will not be broken because she believes completely in her innocence .’’

Prosecutors allege Ms Maxwell (59) groomed girls as young as 14 to have sex with Epstein and lied about her knowledge of his crimes when she testified in an earlier case.

She has been in custody for almost 17 months, after Judge Alison J Nathan repeatedly denied requests for bail.

Prosecutors claim she lured young girls into a trap that she and Epstein had set for them.

But Mr Maxwell says his sister is being blamed by US authorities intent on holding someone responsible for Epstein’s crimes. Epstein killed himself in jail in 2019 before he could face trial.

Ms Maxwell is the youngest of the late media mogul Robert Maxwell’s nine children.

The family continues to demand she be released on bail, arguing that the conditions of her detention are tantamount to torture . The six remaining siblings this week asked the United Nations to investigate Ms Maxwell’s “inhumane” treatment.

“The denial of bail is wholly inappropriate,” Mr Maxwell said. “Some very famous, infamous people were granted bail, most recently the killer of George Floyd, a murderer; John Gotti, another murderer; Harvey Weinstein, Bill Cosby, Bernie Madoff.

“These are all men, of course, who got bail. Ghislaine is a woman who somehow doesn’t get bail.”