Prince Andrew denies U.S. sex abuse claims
Any suggestion of impropriety with under age minors is categorically untrue. STATEMENT FROM BUCKINGHAM PALACE
LONDON — Buckingham Palace has taken the unprecedented step of formally denying the Duke of York sexually abused a 17-year-old girl after claims that he took part in an under-age orgy were made in U.S. court papers.
Prince Andrew said through a spokesman that he “categorically denied” the allegations that he had abused the teenage “sex slave” on three occasions.
The unnamed alleged victim claimed she had been “loaned out” to Prince Andrew by his former friend Jeffrey Epstein, an investment banker who is a registered sex offender after serving a jail sentence for soliciting paid sex with a minor.
Epstein is said to have told the girl to give the prince “whatever he demanded” and is accused of farming her out to rich and powerful friends so he could later blackmail her abusers.
The documents also allege that when Epstein struck a plea-bargain deal with prosecutors in 2008, the prince made “efforts on his behalf” to lobby for a favourable arrangement.
The unnamed litigant, now 30, claims she was forced to have “sexual relations” with Andrew at a flat in London, at a Caribbean island and an undisclosed location in New York.
The court papers claim that Andrew carried out “acts of sexual abuse” against the girl, who was 17 at the time, legally a minor in Florida. The girl’s age suggests the allegations date to 2001. The prince is not a party to the court action, and has not been given the opportunity to rebut the allegations through the court.
Buckingham Palace’s usual stance when confronted with allegations of an extreme nature is to maintain a dignified silence, but the fact that such detailed claims were made in court documents — “leading to them being reported by the mainstream media” — forced it into confronting the issue head on.
A spokesman said: “This relates to long-running and ongoing civil proceedings in the U.S. to which the Duke of York is not a party. As such we would not comment on the detail. However, for the avoidance of doubt, any suggestion of impropriety with underage minors is categorically untrue.”
The allegations were made in the latest round of a six-year lawsuit brought by women who say they were exploited by Epstein and who claim they should have been consulted before he was allowed to enter into a plea-bargain agreement with prosecutors.
Andrew’s friendship with Epstein, which continued after the banker had served his prison sentence, caused such controversy that he ultimately stepped down from his role as the U.K.’s trade ambassador.
In 2011 Virginia Roberts, a mother of three living in Australia, waived her anonymity to confirm she was one of 40 women abused by Epstein, and claimed at the time that she had also been “sexually exploited by Epstein’s adult male peers including royalty.”