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One of the victims of the convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein has called for Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to answer questions in the US, while a lawyer for the former royal’s accuser said those who had previously believed his denials “should be ashamed of themselves”.
Speaking to the Guardian after the release of some of the Epstein files, the tranche of documents related to the disgraced financier, Marina Lacerda, an Epstein survivor, said Mountbatten-Windsor should be “brought to justice”.
The man previously known as Prince Andrew has been accused of sexually abusing Virginia Giuffre, who he met in 2001 when she was 17 – something he has always denied. Giuffre took her own life in April.
Documents released this week appear to show Mountbatten-Windsor asking Epstein’s fixer Ghislaine Maxwell to arrange meetings with “inappropriate friends” while she sought “friendly and discreet and fun” girls on his behalf.
Giuffre’s lawyer, Brad Edwards, told the Guardian that anyone who had accepted Mountbatten-Windsor’s denials should “be ashamed of themselves”.
“Virginia is an extraordinarily brave hero,” said Edwards, a representative for the late campaigner, whose memoir detailing the alleged abuse was published posthumously in October.
“Anyone who ever gave any credence to the denials of Virginia’s claims by Epstein, Maxwell, or Andrew should be ashamed of themselves,” he added.
Lacerda, who is originally from Brazil and now lives in the US, met Epstein, then a financier, when she was 14 years old and was exploited by him for three years. Though she has not met the former prince, she is one of many survivors calling for accountability for those accused of involvement in the trafficking of women and girls by Epstein.
“I think the first thing that needs to be done here is that the UK needs to bring [Mountbatten-Windsor] to justice,” she said.
She said the US government should have done a more thorough investigation into Giuffre’s claims about her alleged abuser, who had his titles and honours removed in October this year over his friendship with Epstein, who killed himself in prison in 2019.
“A lot of people didn’t believe her. Everybody ignored it and he was quiet, and at this point it’s like, really? This is what it comes down to – she had to pass away and come out with a book.
“It’s not OK. It’s disgusting, I’m sorry.
“We have many prominent people who are not being brought to justice or just getting swept under the carpet.”
The files also show that the FBI sought to question Mountbatten-Windsor about his links to a second millionaire sex offender, Peter Nygard. He refused and no further action was taken.
“He does need to come to America [to be questioned], but I don’t think he will, to be honest with you. It is just the right thing to do,” said Lacerda.
The latest release of the documents from the US Department of Justice appeared to expose emails between Epstein’s fixer Maxwell and Mountbatten-Windsor in which the former royal asked her to arrange meetings with “inappropriate friends”.
In the emails from 2001 and 2002, a man named “A” talked about being in Balmoral, the royal residence in the Scottish Highlands, and about the loss of his valet. Reports from 2001 record that Mountbatten-Windsor’s valet, Michael Perry, 61, died days before the email was sent. “A” also wrote about his two girls, though did not name Beatrice and Eugenie, and about leaving the “RN” around the same time Mountbatten-Windsor left the Royal Navy.
“Have you found me some new inappropriate friends?” the person, A, asked in one email to Maxwell on 16 August 2001.
In later emails, Maxwell wrote to an associate asking for girls who were “friendly and discreet and fun” for a man named Andrew who was making a trip to Peru. She said “some 2 legged sight seeing (read intelligent pretty fun and from good families) and he will be very happy”.
This coincided with an official trip taken by Mountbatten-Windsor to Peru, to mark the 50th anniversary of his mother Queen Elizabeth II’s reign.
Giuffre killed herself in April after years of denials from the former prince ahead of the publication of her memoir Nobody’s Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice.
In the memoir, she said she met him in March 2001 when she was 17 and he was 41. She was introduced by Maxwell, who is now serving a 20-year prison sentence for sex trafficking, taken for dinner with the then-prince and with Epstein, and later to a nightclub.
“On the way back, Maxwell told me, ‘When we get home, you are to do for him what you do for Jeffrey.’”
She wrote: “He was friendly enough, but still entitled – as if he believed having sex with me was his birthright.”
Giuffre said she was later given $15,000 by Epstein and was forced to have sex with Mountbatten-Windsor on two more occasions.
The former Duke of York has previously said of claims made in the book: “I vigorously deny the accusations against me.” He reached a settlement with her in 2022.
The Guardian was unable to reach him or a representative about the latest allegations.
