Jail transfer of Epstein accomplice Ghislaine Maxwell questioned in Congress

Mr Blanche meeting Maxwell over two days last July raised eyebrows at the time, with lawyers casting doubt on the credibility on any information she gave because of the strong motivation to seek leniency.

In subsequently released transcripts, she repeatedly denied witnessing any sexually inappropriate behaviour involving Donald Trump, who has faced scrutiny over his past friendship with late sex offender Epstein, which the president has said ended decades ago.

She also praised Mr Trump, calling him a “gentleman in all respects”.

A short time after the interviews, Maxwell was moved from a low-security federal prison in Florida to a minimum-security prison camp in Texas.

Mr Blanche later defended the transfer, highlighting threats made against her.

Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence in the US for luring young girls for Epstein to sexually abuse.

The paedophile financier was found dead in his cell at a federal jail in Manhattan, New York, in August 2019 while he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges. His death was ruled as a suicide.

Questions over the treatment of Maxwell in jail were raised again after former attorney general Pam Bondi gave evidence behind closed doors to the House of Representatives Oversight Committee about the handling of the Epstein investigation and the bungled release of documents.

In her opening statement, Ms Bondi said it was her deputy, Mr Blanche, who is now the acting attorney general, who had overseen the process to publish the case files, required under a law passed by Congress.

She called it “an enormously complicated and labour-intensive process” and conceded the department had made redaction errors.

Ms Bondi also distanced herself from Maxwell’s jail transfer, according to Congressman Suhas Subramanyam, who sits on the committee.

Speaking outside the hearing, Mr Subramanyam said: “She said she wasn’t involved at all in the process of moving her (Maxwell), moving her to another prison, but she wasn’t sure if that new prison was even a lower security prison, which factually it is.

“She said that these things happen all the time because you want to protect some of these folks in prison.

“Well, that’s true, but do we really need to protect Ghislaine Maxwell right after she just talked to Todd Blanche about the Epstein files.

“It seemed too coincidental, but again she doesn’t recall a lot of other things. It was a really unimpressive and disappointing interview today, but not surprising to us.”

Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the committee, said: “We asked questions about Ghislaine Maxwell and the transfer and again she referred those questions to Todd Blanche and the Bureau of Prisons.

“So let’s be clear, we have many questions for Mr Blanche and for the Bureau of Prisons that yet Republicans are refusing to ask.

“Why was she transferred to a less secure facility?

“And Ms Bondi claims to have no knowledge of the actual transfer, no knowledge that it was a less secure prison, and didn’t know about it until she found out after the fact, and then refused to answer additional questions.”

The criticism comes after reports that some Republican members on the committee were open to Maxwell being given a pardon in return for her giving evidence before them.

She has previously declined to answer questions by the congressional inquiry, invoking her fifth amendment right against self-incrimination.

The scandal has had far-reaching consequences in the UK.

The former prince, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, was stripped of his titles by the King, and Lord Peter Mandelson was fired as UK ambassador to the US.

Both were arrested in February on suspicion of misconduct in public office over their connections with Epstein.

They were subsequently released under investigation.

It recently emerged that detectives investigating Andrew will consider allegations of sexual misconduct as part of their inquiry.

He has denied any wrongdoing over his links to Epstein.