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The son of Norway’s crown princess, Marius Borg Høiby, has been arrested on new charges just days before the start of his rape trial, as his mother continues to face questions over her relationship with Jeffrey Epstein.
The Oslo police district said Høiby had been arrested on Sunday evening on suspicion of assault, making threats with a knife and violating a restraining order.
The arrest came shortly before Høiby, 29, is due to stand trial in Oslo on charges of 38 offences including four counts of rape, the domestic abuse of a former partner and the illegal filming of a number of women without their knowledge or consent.
The trial is expected to start on Tuesday and take place over seven weeks. Høiby has denied the most serious charges, including those of sexual abuse.
Police have requested four weeks of imprisonment for Høiby on the grounds of preventing him from reoffending. Oslo district court is expected to make a decision on whether he will be detained at 3pm local time on Monday.
Andreas Kruszewski, a police prosecutor in Oslo police district, said: “The Oslo police district can confirm that Marius Borg Høiby was arrested on Sunday evening and charged with bodily harm, making threats involving a knife, and breach of a restraining order.
“The police have requested four weeks of pre-trial detention due to the risk of reoffending. The detention hearing will be held in chambers. Beyond this, the police have no further comments at this time.”
Høiby’s arrest comes at a moment of great tension for the Norwegian royal family.
Over the weekend the crown princess, Mette-Marit, was forced to respond to revelations about her relationship with the late sex offender Epstein after her name appeared nearly 1,000 times in the newly unsealed files released by the US justice department on Friday.
In a statement, Mette-Marit said the files “showed poor judgment”, adding: “I deeply regret having had any contact with Epstein. It is simply embarrassing.”
The Norwegian prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre, said on Monday he expected “the Norwegians mentioned” in the files to “comment on the truth about what happened”.
“The crown princess herself has stated that she has shown poor judgment, which I agree with,” he said.
Inclusion in the files does not imply wrongdoing.
The emails, which include Mette-Marit calling Epstein “very charming”, “soft-hearted” and “such a sweetheart”, suggest they were in close contact between 2011 and 2014, years after he pleaded guilty to charges that included soliciting prostitution from a minor in Florida.
Mette-Marit married Crown Prince Haakon, the future king of Norway, in 2001. Her son, Høiby, was born from a previous relationship.
In one email, from 2012, Mette-Marit asked Epstein if it was “inappropriate for a mother to suggest two naked women carrying a surfboard for my 15 yr old sons wallpaper”. Soon before, she emailed Epstein about him being on a “wife hunt” in Paris in which she said the French capital was “good for adultery” and said that “Scandis (are) better wife material”.
After receiving flowers from him when she was feeling unwell, she sent him a thankyou email signed, “Love, Mm.” The files also indicate that she stayed at Epstein’s house in Palm Beach, Florida, for four days in 2013 when he was away.
The files show that she had “Googled” Epstein in 2011 and told him “it didn’t look too good” with a smiling face emoji.
She has expressed her “deep sympathy and solidarity” with Epstein’s victims and said that she was responsible “for not having checked Epstein’s background more closely and not understanding quickly enough what kind of person he was”.
The palace said Mette-Marit had ended written contact with Epstein in 2014 as she felt he was “trying to use his relationship with the crown princess as leverage with other people”.
