THAT PHOTO IS A FAKE, MAXWELL SAYS
LONDON: Disgraced former socialite Ghislaine Maxwell claims in a jailhouse interview with a British journalist that a decades-old photograph of Prince Andrew with his sexual abuse accuser Virginia Giuffre is “fake”.
Maxwell, a friend to British royalty, is serving 20 years in a Florida prison for helping late financier Jeffrey Epstein sexually abuse girls.
Giuffre has claimed she was trafficked by the pair to, among others, Andrew, King Charles III’s younger brother.
The 39-year-old sued the discredited royal in a US court, claiming they had sex in London when she was 17 and a minor under US law.
He settled the sexual assault lawsuit at considerable cost last year, sparing him the public humiliation of a trial.
The prince, 62, has not been criminally charged and denies the accusations.
But he stepped back from royal duties and was stripped of his military titles following a public outcry over the reported £12m (then-$16.3m) settlement last year.
A photograph of Andrew with his arm around Giuffre’s waist and Maxwell standing next to them – said to have been taken in London in 2001 – is seen as crucial to the claim against the prince.
But in her US federal prison interview with TalkTV, to air in Britain on Monday evening, Maxwell insists the image is not genuine.
“It’s a fake. I don’t believe it’s real for a second, in fact I’m sure it’s not,” she states.
“There’s never been an original and further there is no photograph. I’ve only ever seen a photocopy of it.”
The late Queen Elizabeth II’s youngest son has insisted he never met Giuffre, and in a disastrous 2019 BBC interview also questioned the photo’s authenticity.
“I don’t believe that photograph was taken in the way that has been suggested,” he said at the time.
“It’s a photograph of a photograph of a photograph … Nobody can prove whether or not that photograph has been doctored.”
The comments by Maxwell, who is appealing against her US conviction, come after British newspapers said Andrew would try to overturn the settlement with Giuffre.
It follows her dropping a separate abuse claim against celebrity lawyer Alan Dershowitz.
The Sun reported Andrew was consulting US lawyers Andrew Brettler and Blair Berk and hopes to force a retraction or even an apology, which could pave the way for a royal rehabilitation.
“I can tell you with confidence that the Prince Andrew team is now considering legal options”, a “well-placed source” told the tabloid.