EXCLUSIVE: 'They had been living in perfect harmony.' Ghislaine Maxwell's stepchildren were 'heartbroken' by her arrest because they thought of her as their 'proxy mother,' as husband offers $30M bail to have her home by Christmas
Ghislaine Maxwell's stepchildren were heartbroken by her arrest because they thought of her as their 'proxy mother', one of her representatives has claimed exclusively to DailyMail.com.
PR executive Brian Basham said Scott Borgerson, Maxwell's husband, is not the only one who has been suffering since her arrest in July.
Borgerson, 44, has a 13-year-old son and a 10-year-old daughter with his ex-wife Rebecca, who he divorced before moving in with Maxwell to a $2.4 million home in Manchester-by-the-Sea, Massachusetts.
The children were shocked when Maxwell, 58, was arrested on allegations she procured girls as young as 14 for Jeffrey Epstein, Basham claimed.
Basham, who is based in the UK and is coordinating efforts to free Maxwell, told DailyMail.com: 'Scott is devastated and so are his children because Ghislaine has been their proxy mother.
'They had been living in perfect harmony until this broke. I'm told Scott's kids have had to be taken out of school because of all the attention'.
Ghislaine Maxwell's step-children are heartbroken by her arrest because they thought of her as their 'proxy mother', one of her representatives has claimed. Scott Borgerson, Maxwell's husband, has a 13-year-old son and a 10-year-old daughter with his ex-wife Rebecca
The children were shocked when Maxwell was arrested in July on allegations she procured girls as young as 14 for Jeffrey Epstein, Basham claimed. Pictured: Borgerson's ex-wife Rebecca their two children
They lived together at their $2.4m oceanfront home in Manchester-by-the-sea in Massachusetts (pictured), DailyMail.com first revealed, until she bought her own $1m property in New Hampshire, where she was arrested in July.
Basham said the prosecution of Maxwell, a now disgraced British socialite, for allegedly recruiting children for Jeffrey Epstein and her treatment in prison were completely unjust.
He said: 'This is evil….it's like something out of North Korea, not America'.
Basham's portrait of Maxwell living an idyllic family life with children around is a jarring contrast to the claims of her alleged victims.
They have described her as Epstein's chief recruiter, lieutenant and the 'mastermind' behind his international sex trafficking operation that preyed on underage girls.
As Sarah Ransome, one Epstein victim, said in an interview: 'She orchestrated the whole thing for Jeffrey'.
This week a report claimed that Maxwell is prepared to offer a $30m bail package to get free before Christmas, a staggering sum that dwarfs other high profile criminals such as Harvey Weinstein.
Some $25 million will come from Borgerson, a wealthy former chief executive of shipping data company CargoMetrics.
The other $5 million will come from Maxwell's siblings and she will be willing to give up her three passports and submit to home confinement.
The package will be put before a federal judge in New York in the coming days with the aim of getting Maxwell out of the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn in time for the holidays.
Basham said there is an ongoing discussion about Borgerson's name being redacted from the bail application to avoid more attention but his name was 'everywhere in July' so it was hardly a secret.
The reports said that Borgerson, who at 44 is 14 years Maxwell’s junior - she is 58 - left his wife Rebecca (left and right) in 2014 and tried to reconcile before finally divorcing her in December 2015
The other $5m of the $30M bail package will come from Maxwell's siblings, including her brothers Kevin and Ian Maxwell, who like Maxwell (pictured back row, center with her siblings and father) are the children of the late disgraced British newspaper tycoon Robert Maxwell
He said: 'Everybody associated with this is suffering from the lynch mob mentality. They are worried, even frightened'.
Basham pointed out that this week was the 40th anniversary of John Lennon's death, suggesting that Borgerson may be the victim of a similar attack by a loner.
He said: 'People are worried, they are frightened because of the lynch mob'.
As to the $25 million from Borgerson, Basham said: 'It's a lot of money but he's a chief executive of his own company and he's an entrepreneur so in that context I can see him having that kind of money'.
DailyMail.com was the first to report that Borgerson and Maxwell were an item after Epstein was arrested last August.
Borgerson, who is 14 years Maxwell’s junior, left his wife in 2014 and tried to reconcile before finally divorcing her in December 2015.
Asked when Maxwell and Borgerson got married, Basham said '2016 resonates' as the year the wedding took place, but claimed he did not know any other details.
That year was a big one for the couple and in April 2016 Maxwell sold her New York townhouse for $16m.
In June a woman called 'Jennifer Ellmax' - a combination of names Maxwell has used in the past - appeared on a building permit for Manchester-by-the-sea home three days before it was sold to an LLC to disguise the owners.
Borgerson is believed to have met Maxwell six years ago through speaking engagements connected to ocean preservation, a subject on which they share a passion. They were both pictured speaking at the Arctic Circle Assembly in Reykjavik, Iceland, in 2014 (left and right)
The report in the Daily Telegraph appears to confirm for the first time that Maxwell and Borgerson (pictured walking Maxwell's dog) are married
Sources said that Maxwell was a homebody who did not leave the house much and liked to go swimming in the ocean and jogging.
When Borgerson's children would come to stay Maxwell would be there and she reportedly made them lunch and drove them to school.
Basham said that Maxwell did not flee the US last August when Epstein was arrested 'because she thinks she's innocent'.
He said that having a husband in the US was a factor, but she was clear in her mind she did nothing wrong.
Since Ghislaine was arrested Basham has been spearheading what has become known as 'Operation Get Ghislaine Out'.
Over the past five months she has been held in a 9ft by 7ft cell and claims that she lost at least 20lbs in weight and some of her hair because of the poor prison diet.
Her lawyers have said that she is woken up every 15 minutes with a torchlight to be searched even though she is not a suicide risk.
They claim that the Bureau of Prisons is making an example of her to overcompensate for its failings which led Epstein to hang himself in his cell last August while in another federal prison in New York.
Basham said: 'The Department of Justice is perverting the course of justice. It's outrageous. There is no reason for her to be in prison and in fact there's no reason she should have been arrested.
'Why wasn't she arrested when Epstein was arrested?
'The way she is being treated is evil, just evil. How can you prepare properly for your defense when you are being woken up every 15 minutes with a torch and are sleep deprived?
'It's ridiculous she's having to offer so much money in bail - Bernie Madoff was only $10m and he got bail'.
In June a woman called 'Jennifer Ellmax' - a combination of names Maxwell has used in the past - appeared on a building permit for Manchester-by-the-sea home three days before it was sold to an LLC to disguise the owners
DailyMail.com can reveal that two weeks after Maxwell was denied bail on July 14, Borgerson took back control of a $1.2m apartment in Boston (pictured) he owns. By doing so it would allow him to more easily sell it to raise funds
In October reports said that Borgerson had stepped down as chief executive of CargoMetrics to avoid being a 'distraction'.
DailyMail.com can reveal that two weeks after Maxwell was denied bail on July 14, Borgerson took back control of a $1.2m apartment in Boston he owns.
By doing so it would allow him to more easily sell it to raise funds.
He paid the nominal sum of $1 to John McBrine, an estate planning specialist with Boston based lawyers Nutter, Fish and McLennan who have worked with Borgerson and Maxwell before.
McBrine's online profile says his expertise is 'implementing strategies to minimize estate and gift tax consequences of wealth transfers across generations'.
He also helps create 'sophisticated estate plans for clients with complex asset profiles and difficult family dynamics'.
Maxwell is accused of procuring three girls for Epstien between 1994 and 1997 and perjuring herself in a separate civil case.
She denies the allegations for which she faces up to 35 years in jail.
