A newly launched electronic mail appears to confirm the authenticity of {a photograph} of Britain’s Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor along with his arm across the waist of Virginia Giuffre, one of probably the most distinguished victims of Jeffrey Epstein’s intercourse trafficking ring.
The disgraced former prince has lengthy denied allegations he sexually assaulted Giuffre whereas she was a teen and had beforehand questioned whether or not the now-infamous photo had been doctored.
But within the trove of new documents launched by the US Justice Department final week is a 2015 electronic mail to Epstein purportedly from his former girlfriend and longtime confederate Ghislaine Maxwell that means the picture of Andrew and Giuffre is real.
The message was headed “draft statement” and despatched by a “G Maxwell” to the late convicted intercourse offender in January 2015.
“It was in London when (redacted) met a number of friends of mine including Prince Andrew. A photograph was taken as I imagine she wanted to show it to friends and family,” the e-mail reads.
Details within the assertion and subsequent emails from Epstein the identical day point out the redacted title was Giuffre.
Maxwell, who is serving a 20-year sentence for baby intercourse trafficking and different crimes, additionally appears within the {photograph}.
The message provides that “G Maxwell” didn’t see “anything improper that took place at my home.”
In a separate electronic mail to Epstein, “G Maxwell” mentioned, “I have to distance myself from you in statement too. And they need me to say I was not aware of massage (with) andrew in my house.”
NCS has approached Maxwell’s representatives and has tried to contact Mountbatten-Windsor’s representatives for remark.
The Epstein scandal has dogged Mountbatten-Windsor for years, culminating in him being stripped of his royal titles and ordered to leave the Royal Lodge on the Crown’s Windsor Estate by his brother, King Charles III, final 12 months.
Giuffre’s household advised British public broadcaster BBC that the discharge of the e-mail was a “vindicating moment.”
“It shows that not only was she not lying this entire time … she was telling the truth,” Giuffre’s brother Sky Roberts mentioned.
“It’s a moment where we’re really proud of our sister. I think that it is a vindicating moment, but we also want to use this as a moment to remind people to believe survivors,” Roberts added.
Giuffre, who died by suicide in 2025, repeatedly claimed that she was compelled to have intercourse with the then-prince whereas underage on three events – in London, New York and at Little St. James, colloquially often called Epstein Island. She claimed that Mountbatten-Windsor was conscious she was underage within the US once they have been launched.
Mountbatten-Windsor has denied all of Giuffre’s accusations and says he doesn’t recall ever assembly her. In 2022, he reached a settlement with Giuffre, settling a intercourse abuse lawsuit. While he didn’t admit wrongdoing, Andrew did acknowledge Giuffre’s struggling as a sufferer of intercourse trafficking.
“I have no recollection of ever meeting this lady, none whatsoever,” Mountbatten-Windsor advised the BBC in a bombshell tv interview in 2019.
He mentioned in the identical sit-down that he had “no recollection of the photograph ever being taken,” and added that whereas it was him within the photo, “we can’t be certain” as to whether or not it’s his hand on her.
When pressed to make clear whether or not he believed the photo was faux, Mountbatten-Windsor mentioned: “Nobody can prove whether or not that photograph has been doctored,” including, “but I don’t recollect that photograph ever being taken.”
Maxwell had additionally beforehand claimed the picture was not real. Speaking from a Florida jail to British broadcaster TalkTV in 2023, Maxwell mentioned she doesn’t “believe it is real for a second, in fact, I’m sure it’s not. There has never been an original.”
In her posthumous memoir “Nobody’s Girl,” Giuffre detailed the day the photo was taken when she first met Mountbatten-Windsor at Maxwell’s townhouse in London on March 10, 2001, when she was 17. She mentioned she was compelled to have intercourse with Andrew a number of hours later.
Giuffre mentioned the photo was taken together with her disposable Kodak FunSaver digicam and she developed the photo a number of days later in West Palm Beach on March 13, 2001. Giuffre mentioned she confirmed the photo to The Mail on Sunday reporter Sharon Churcher and photographer Michael Thomas throughout an interview in Australia in 2011, when Thomas took pictures of the unique print.
A day after the {photograph} was printed within the British press, Mountbatten-Windsor emailed Epstein saying: “It would seem we are in this together and will have to rise above it… Otherwise keep in close touch and we’ll play some more soon!!!!,” the DOJ paperwork present.
The alternate contradicts claims Mountbatten-Windsor made to the BBC that he severed all ties with Epstein in 2010.
Separately, an electronic mail despatched by Epstein on July 1, 2011 to a recipient who has been redacted within the printed paperwork mentioned: “Yes she was on my plane, and yes she had her picture taken with Andrew as many of my employees have.” The electronic mail doesn’t title which particular person he is speaking about, however particulars once more point out it was Giuffre.
The newest tranche of paperwork, which embody images showing to show Mountbatten-Windsor on all fours, leaning over a lady or woman mendacity on the ground has ramped up the political stress on the disgraced royal. British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has referred to as on Mountbatten-Windsor to testify earlier than the US Congress about his hyperlinks to Epstein.
NCS’s Todd Symons, Max Foster and Lauren Said-Moorhouse contributed reporting.