The U.S. Department of Justice on 14 July urged the Supreme Court to reject Ghislaine Maxwell’s petition for review of her sex-trafficking conviction, telling the justices that a 2007 non-prosecution agreement Jeffrey Epstein negotiated in Florida neither covered Maxwell nor bound prosecutors in New York. Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote that the former socialite, now 63, "does not show that [her argument] would succeed in any court of appeals." Maxwell filed a reply brief on 28 July insisting the agreement shielded “any co-conspirator” and accusing the government of reneging on its word. Her lawyers said appeals courts are split on whether such agreements apply nationally and asked the justices to resolve the issue. The Court is expected to decide this autumn whether to grant certiorari. Maxwell was convicted in late 2021 of five counts, including trafficking a minor, and was sentenced in 2022 to 20 years in federal prison, which she is serving in Tallahassee with a projected release in 2037. Earlier in July she spent two days answering questions from Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche amid political scrutiny of the Trump administration’s handling of Epstein-related records.