Australian Giuffre family says Prince Andrew arrest is a ‘win’ for the girls
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor held in custody for 12 hours following arrest. The family of one Australian woman who died by suicide after allegedly being forced to have sex with the former prince reacts.
Source: BBC Newsnight
The family of Virginia Giuffre, who alleged she was forced to have sex with former prince Andrew when she was 17, says his arrest has lifted their broken hearts.
Giuffre, who received an out-of-court settlement from the prince, died by suicide in Australia last year.
“At last. Today, our broken hearts have been lifted at the news that no one is above the law, not even royalty,” her siblings said in a statement late on Thursday.
“On behalf of our sister, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, we extend our gratitude to the UK’s Thames Valley Police for their investigation and arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor.
“He was never a prince. For survivors everywhere, Virginia did this for you.”
In an interview with the BBC, Giuffre’s brother Sky Roberts added that the arrest was a win for survivors of Jeffrey Epstein’s web of abuse.
Even though the arrest was not related to sex trafficking, he said it was a “very good start” and hoped that it would lead to further investigations and arrests.
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“It doesn’t matter your wealth or your power, you don’t have a separate set of laws that applies to you… I think we’re seeing that in the UK right now,” Roberts said.
Roberts’ wife Amanda told the BBC: “We are hopeful that this investigation now starts to open up that further probe into the sexual assault allegations… it is still a win.”
Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office on Thursday (UK time), following disclosures related to his relationship with late paedophile.
The former prince has for years faced allegations about his contacts with Epstein, most recently following the release of more than three million pages of documents related to the disgraced financier from the US Justice Department.
Mountbatten-Windsor, 66, has denied any wrongdoing in his friendship with Epstein.
Andrew’s the fall from grace
2011: The then prince is forced to resign as Britain’s special trade envoy following the first reports of his links to Epstein, who was convicted and jailed three years earlier for sex offences involving a minor.
July 2019: Epstein is arrested for a second time on charges of sex trafficking and later dies by suicide in a New York jail cell. The news focuses public attention of allegations that the then-prince had sex with at least one underage teenager trafficked by Epstein. Mountbatten-Windsor denies the allegations.
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November 2019: Mountbatten-Windsor attempts to staunch the flood of criticism by agreeing to an on-camera grilling by the BBC’s Emily Maitlis. The interview backfires when he defends his relationship with Epstein, fails to show empathy for his victims and offers explanations of his behaviour that many people find hard to believe. The prince says he broke off contact with Epstein in December 2010, a date that will come back to haunt him.
Amid the fallout from the interview, Buckingham Palace subsequently announces he will suspend all royal duties “for the foreseeable future” and he is stripped of his role as patron of 230 charities.
2022: The prince agrees to settle a New York civil lawsuit filed by Virginia Giuffre, who alleged that she was forced to have sex with him when she was 17. While Mountbatten-Windsor admitted to none of Giuffre’s allegations, he acknowledged that she had suffered as a victim of sexual abuse. Legal experts estimate that the undisclosed settlement cost the royal as much as $10 million. The source of the funds has remained murky.
April 2025: Giuffre dies by suicide in Australia, where she had lived since about 2002.
October 2025: British newspapers reveal the prince emailed Epstein on February. 28, 2011, more than two months after he had told BBC he had cut off all contact with his one-time friend. He wrote they were “in this together” and would “have to rise above it.”
Mountbatten-Windsor subsequently says he is giving up his royal titles, including Duke of York, and other honours because “the continued accusations about me distract from the work of His Majesty and the royal family”.
In her posthumous book, Giuffre recounts details of how she first met the prince in March 2001, and that she was forced three times to have sex with him.
The King strips his brother of his remaining titles and honours, including the one he has held since birth — prince. From henceforth, he is to be known as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor — he subsequently gains a hyphen. The King also serves notice for his brother to leave Royal Lodge, his 30-room stately home near Windsor Castle, where he has lived for more than 20 years. He agrees to relocate to the royal family’s private and remote Sandringham Estate
January 2026: The US Justice Department publishes the Epstein files, which appear to reveal further unsavoury details about the relationship between Mountbatten-Windsor and Epstein. One picture of the prince crouching over a motionless and unnamed woman in what appears to be Epstein’s apartment in New York causes widespread consternation and disgust. Among the allegations that emerge over the ensuing days is that Mountbatten-Windsor sent Epstein confidential reports from a 2010 tour of Southeast Asia, which he undertook as Britain’s envoy for international trade. That proved to be the catalyst for his arrest.
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-with AAP
