NEW YORK, (Reuters) - Ghislaine Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years in prison yesterday for helping the sex offender and globetrotting financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse teenage girls, in what a judge called a "horrific scheme" that inflicted "incalculable" harm on victims.

The British socialite, 60, was convicted in December of five charges, including sex trafficking a minor, for recruiting and grooming four girls to have sexual encounters with Epstein, then her boyfriend, between 1994 and 2004.

Speaking at her sentencing hearing in Manhattan federal court before learning the sentence, Maxwell called Epstein a "manipulative, cunning and controlling man" who fooled everyone in his orbit. She said she was "sorry" for the pain that his victims experienced.

"It is the greatest regret of my life that I ever met Jeffrey Epstein," Maxwell said.

Maxwell's month-long trial in late 2021 was widely seen as the reckoning that Epstein - who killed himself in a Manhattan jail cell in 2019 at age 66 while awaiting his own sex trafficking trial - never had.

It was one of the highest-profile cases in the wake of the #MeToo movement, which encouraged women to speak out about sexual abuse, often at the hands of wealthy and powerful people.

In imposing the sentence, U.S. Circuit Judge Alison Nathan said Maxwell did not appear to express remorse or accept responsibility.

"Maxwell directly and repeatedly and over the course of many years participated in a horrific scheme to entice, transport and traffic underage girls, some as young as 14, for sexual abuse by and with Jeffrey Epstein," Nathan said. "The damage done to these young girls was incalculable."

Bobbi Sternheim, a lawyer for Maxwell, said Maxwell would appeal, arguing the public scrutiny of the case before the trial "left little room for her to be treated fairly."