Annie Farmer advised jurors she accepted an invite to the financier’s sprawling New Mexico ranch in 1996 hoping Ms Maxwell and Mr Epstein would assist her with tutorial endeavours.
As an alternative, she stated, Ms Maxwell ended up massaging her breasts and Epstein climbed into mattress with out her permission.
Three others have asserted on the trial that started two weeks in the past that Ms Maxwell recruited them to present Mr Epstein massages meant as a ruse for sexual abuse.
Ms Maxwell, 59, has denied fees she groomed underage ladies for Mr Epstein, who killed himself in jail in 2019.
Her legal professionals say the federal government is making her a scapegoat for alleged intercourse crimes dedicated by her one-time boyfriend and moved instantly for a judgement of acquittal after prosecutors rested Friday afternoon.
US District Decide Alison J. Nathan heard temporary arguments and rejected the request that she acquit Maxwell with out the jury ever getting the case.
The decide advised the jury they are going to return Thursday to listen to the defence case, which an lawyer estimated would seemingly final two to 3 days.
The decide has prompt that closing arguments, at a trial initially projected to final six weeks, would possibly happen as early as December 20 if the defence presentation subsequent week solely lasts a day or two.
In her testimony, Ms Farmer recalled the undesirable bodily contact making her really feel like she “simply wished the weekend to be over. … I wished to be performed with it.”
She added: “All these experiences made me really feel like they’d a really completely different curiosity in me.”
Requested by a prosecutor in the beginning of her testimony if she noticed anybody within the courtroom who had ever given her a therapeutic massage, Ms Farmer recognized Ms Maxwell, who was sitting on the defence desk taking a look at Ms Farmer.
Ms Farmer, now 42, took the stand utilizing her true identification, a departure from the choice by three different accusers with related tales who testified underneath pseudonyms or first names solely to guard their privateness.
Two of the others who testified stated they have been simply 14 when the abuse began and that Ms Maxwell typically participated within the encounters.
Ms Farmer testified that she met Mr Epstein at age 16 on a 1996 journey to New York Metropolis to go to her older sister, who was working for him at his Manhattan mansion.
Once they visited him on the dwelling, he “appeared very pleasant and right down to earth,” and even supplied to mentor her, she stated.
She stated that in an outing to the films with Mr Epstein, he reached over to carry her hand and caress her leg.
“I felt sick to my abdomen,” she stated. “It was not one thing I used to be anticipating in any respect.”
When Ms Farmer returned dwelling, she stayed in contact with the rich financier and accepted an invite to journey to New Mexico with a airplane ticket he paid for although, she stated, “after what occurred within the film theatre, I didn’t need to be alone with him”.
She stated she initially felt extra snug as a result of Ms Maxwell was there.
However after they took her to the films, he “instantly started to carry my hand” and rub her foot and arm all through the movie with no effort to cover the behaviour from Ms Maxwell, she stated.
As soon as dwelling, Ms Maxwell insisted on giving Ms Farmer a therapeutic massage and advised her to take off her garments, Ms Farmer testified. Ms Maxwell “pulled down the sheet and uncovered my breasts and beginning rubbing on my breasts,” Farmer stated.
“It didn’t make sense to me that will occur,” she stated. “I so badly wished to get off the desk and have the therapeutic massage be performed.”
Ms Farmer accepted $1.5 million from a fund set as much as compensate Mr Epstein victims, she testified.
The encounters occurred in New Mexico, which didn’t have a selected age of consent statute, though its legal guidelines criminalised all sexual contact of a minor underneath the age of 13 when coercion or pressure is concerned.
On cross-examination, a defence lawyer repeatedly emphasised by means of her questions that Ms Maxwell was not concerned in essentially the most egregious behaviour described by Ms Farmer and elicited that Ms Farmer was unsure she was bare throughout her therapeutic massage, though she was sure that her breasts have been uncovered.
Prosecutors additionally known as Ms Farmer’s former boyfriend and her mom as witnesses to assist her testimony.
David James Mulligan, 42, testified that Ms Farmer advised him that she was “touched on the breast” when she was massaged in New Mexico.
“She advised me that she felt fearful and awkward and helpless,” he stated.
Janice Swain, 71, Ms Farmer’s mom, testified that Mr Epstein advised her earlier than the New Mexico journey that her daughter can be joined by 20 to 25 different college students there.
Ms Swain stated when Ms Farmer arrived dwelling from the journey, she was “quiet and withdrawn”.
When Ms Farmer lastly did say one thing at a later date, she stated: “I do not need to speak about it and I am not going to let it spoil my life,” the mom recalled.
The Related Press doesn’t determine individuals who say they have been victims of sexual abuse until they arrive ahead publicly.
Though Ms Farmer was not recognized by title in court docket paperwork, the practising psychologist has been outspoken in describing her experiences in interviews with the US ABC and The New York Occasions.
Ms Maxwell has been jailed since she was arrested in New Hampshire in July 2020.
When she sought bail, Ms Farmer requested the decide to disclaim it, calling her a “psychopath”.