Duke of York faces fresh woe as Epstein files released in US

THE Duke of York is braced for fresh controversy as a US court prepares to release a tranche of documents relating to the Jeffrey Epstein scandal.

Almost 200 legal papers connected to a 2015 defamation case brought by Virginia Giuffre – who accused Prince Andrew of abusing her as a teenager – against Ghislaine Maxwell, are due to be unsealed this week.

The Giuffre case was settled out of court but the documents will be made public following a successful legal challenge by the Miami Herald newspaper.

They will include the names of about 170 associates of Epstein, the billionaire financier who killed himself while in prison in August 2019, among them, the Duke and Bill Clinton.

The Duke, 63, is understood to feel sanguine about the impending developments and is not expecting to be named extensively.

The files concerning the royal are expected to relate to the testimony of Johanna Sjoberg, who has claimed she was with the Duke and Ms Giuffre, 40 at Epstein’s New York mansion in 2001.

Ms Giuffre has alleged that the gathering marked one of the occasions she was forced to have sex with the Duke.

Evidence from other victims may support her claims, according to ABC News. The Duke has vehemently denied wrongdoing. He settled his civil case with Ms Giuffre out of court in 2022 with no admission of guilt.

Ms Sjoberg, now 43, has claimed that the Duke groped her during a bizarre incident involving a Spitting Image-style puppet at Epstein’s Manhattan home.

In the excerpts of her testimony previously released, she alleged that she had sat on a sofa with the Duke, Ms Giuffre and the puppet, provided by Maxwell. The puppet’s hands, she claimed, were placed on Ms Giuffre’s breast and then in mimicry, Prince Andrew put his hand on Ms Sjoberg’s breast.

Maxwell, in her deposition, denied the claim, saying: “I never gave him a gift of a puppet. I am not aware of any small hand-held puppet that was there.

“There was a puppet – not a puppet – there was a – I don’t know how would you describe it really. A caricature of that was in Jeffrey’s home.”

Asked if she had used the “caricature” to put its hand on someone’s breast, she said: “I don’t recollect. I recollect the puppet but I don’t recollect anything around the puppet.”

Ms Sjoberg, who was a student in Florida at the time, claimed Epstein ordered her to “entertain” the Duke.

She has also said that in mid-1999, she and Ms Giuffre accompanied Epstein to visit Prince Andrew at Balmoral.

‘I never gave him a gift of a puppet. I am not aware of any small hand-held puppet that was there’