Ghislaine Maxwell's victims might not testify if she gets a retrial. But that doesn't mean she's off the hook.

• The Telegraph reported that an accuser may refuse to testify again if Ghislaine Maxwell gets a retrial.
• Experts told Insider that prosecutors could still retry their case against Maxwell if that happens.

As Ghislaine Maxwell's child-sex-trafficking conviction hangs in the balance, her victims who testified in last month's trial against her might be forced to make the agonizing decision of whether they want to take the stand again.

One of the accusers has already indicated she would refuse, The Telegraph reported earlier this week.

But even if one of Maxwell's accusers refuses to testify again, that doesn't mean the disgraced socialite is off the hook, legal experts told Insider.

The prosecutors in Maxwell's case might have to drop some of the six indictments they initially brought against her, but they may also decide to bring a superseding indictment with new accusers.

"Generally, the government is very successful in second trials or third trials, because as they're able to really focus their evidence in those subsequent trials," Sarah Krissoff, a defense lawyer at Day Pitney and a former federal prosecutor, told Insider. "There's an opportunity to learn from their mistakes and streamline the process."

In December, Maxwell was convicted on five of six charges in a Manhattan federal court, but her lawyers requested a retrial this month after a juror gave media interviews indicating he failed to disclose his own experience as a sexual abuse victim during the jury selection process. US District Judge Alison Nathan, who's overseeing the case, hasn't yet decided whether to grant the request.

Since the conviction, even more Maxwell accusers have stepped forward, according to Brad Edwards, an attorney who represents dozens of Epstein victims, including one of the accusers who testified in Maxwell's trial. Edwards said that more of his clients have told him they'd be willing to testify against Maxwell at a criminal trial.

"I don't think a new trial would go any better for her," he told Insider. "In fact, I think it would go worse for her."

The "mass empowerment" of accusers is a common phenomenon in sexual misconduct litigation, according to Arick Fudali, a partner at The Bloom Firm who represented eight Jeffrey Epstein accusers in unrelated cases.

"Anytime someone is held accountable for a crime — like sex trafficking, sexual assault — there's sort of a mass empowerment that comes with it where other victims feel empowered to come forward," he told Insider. "Whether it's against that exact perpetrator or someone else."

Prosecutors would likely have a tighter case

Bringing in new alleged victims to testify, however, would be a lengthy process.

Prosecutors would have to do their due diligence on the accuser, collect evidence to corroborate their claims, and then seek a new grand jury indictment. They would also have to hand over relevant material to Maxwell's lawyers as part of the discovery process and give them time to review and challenge it all. That indictment would get its own trial, and it wouldn't be part of the retrial Maxwell could receive. The whole process could take years.

A more likely scenario, experts told Insider, is that the prosecuting team will cut the indictments they would no longer be able to support without the testimony of the victim who no longer wishes to testify. (Prosecutors could theoretically force that victim to testify at a retrial with subpoena power, but it's extremely unlikely they'll take that route.)

Trying a case with fewer victims is "a little risky," according to Neama Rahmani, a former federal prosecutor who now works in private practice, because juries are less prone to convict the fewer victims there are.

In cases like Maxwell's, where the defense will seek to discredit victims, Rahmani said prosecutors would want to "overwhelm the defense" with multiple victims so that jurors don't get hung up on the believability of any single witness.

"You want to parade a lot of victims before the jury because of those skeptics who say, 'I don't know if I can believe this individual.' You might not believe one, but how are you going to disbelieve four, five, six victims?"

Maxwell, who is 60 years old, was convicted of crimes that carry a sentence of up to 65 years in prison. So a conviction on fewer indictments, for crimes as severe as sex-trafficking children, would still be devastating.

There are also other witnesses prosecutors can bring to the jury to make the testimony of the remaining accusers more concrete. Rahmani said that in high-profile cases like Maxwell's, the witness list is almost always longer than just the witnesses that prosecutors end up calling to the stand.

Prosecutors make sure to have backup witnesses in case people "get cold feet" or witnesses "turn on you," Rahmani said.

It's unclear which accuser spoke to The Telegraph about their reservations testifying again if Maxwell gets a retrial. Three victims took the stand in Maxwell's trial.

A fourth accuser, who testified under the pseudonym "Kate," was initially called by prosecutors to testify as a victim in the case, but the judge ruled that her experiences didn't rise to the level of crimes spelled out in the indictment. Kate was allowed to testify anyway though as a "prior bad acts witness," which are witnesses called to show a pattern of behavior. Rahmani told Insider that prosecutors may decide to call more witnesses like Kate to back up the main accusers' stories.

It's also possible that prosecutors may try to move fast and streamline their case.

"The prosecution could also say, 'Listen, this one witness was by far the best. Let's just rewind it, make it only a couple of charges,'" Fudali told Insider.

Maxwell might also decide to take a plea deal

Just because Maxwell wants a retrial and victims may drop out doesn't mean that she is in a great spot.

Prosecutors may have a new chance to convict her on the one charge jurors initially acquitted her on. Then there's the possibility that prosecutors will seek a new indictment with victims who newly stepped forward. She would also have trouble finding a new fair jury — it won't be easy to find new jurors in Manhattan who weren't aware of her first guilty verdict, Fudali pointed out. Not to mention there's still a whole other trial planned over perjury charges where prosecutors allege Maxwell lied in a deposition about trafficking girls to Epstein.

"The victims who are going to repeat their testimonies are going to come back and are now going to be even more prepared for what the cross-examination is going to look like," Fudali told Insider. "They can review their answers, they can review the questioning, they can review how they answered certain questions, and they can obviously improve their testimony."

"If anyone gets the advantage of improving in a second trial, it's the prosecution," Fudali added.

Maxwell might be thinking now that it's time to make a guilty plea. If she does, it'll likely be negotiated together with the perjury charges still pending against her. Prosecutors have already signaled they're willing to negotiate over their charges. In a court filing earlier this month, they said they would drop the charges if Maxwell isn't granted a new trial.

"A guilty verdict can be sobering. It can be a wake-up call for a defendant," Fudai said. "Maxwell, now knowing the guilty verdict at the first trial, she might say, 'Okay, the possibility of another guilty verdict is very real and maybe I should take a deal now."