Prince Andrew tried to hire ‘internet trolls’ to hassle Virginia Giuffre, book claims | Prince Andrew

Prince Andrew’s team tried to recruit “internet trolls” to trick his accuser, Virginia Giuffre, into hiding behind the “well-guarded gates” of Balmoral Castle to prevent herself from being served with court documents, according to allegations in her posthumous memoir.

Giuffre wrote about the secret settlement of her sexual abuse civil lawsuit against the Crown in 2022, rumored to be worth $12 million (£9 million), that her lawyers would “want the moon” and that her team agreed it “has to be about more than just money.”

“After casting doubt on my credibility for so long – Prince Andrew’s team went so far as to recruit internet trolls to harass me – the Duke of York also owes me a meaningful apology,” he wrote.

“Of course we would never get a confession. The agreements were designed to avoid that. But we were working towards the next best thing: general acknowledgment of what I experienced.”

Giuffre agreed to a one-year speaking ban to avoid “darkening” the late queen’s platinum anniversary celebrations in 2022.

Giuffre died by suicide in April at the age of 41. Her memoir, Nobody’s Daughter, published on Tuesday, comes amid mounting pressure for Andrew to be officially stripped of his titles.

The Prince announced before publication that he would no longer use the current but inactive titles of Duke of York or Knight of the Order of the Garter.

While King Charles visited Manchester on Monday to show his support for the Jewish community and those affected by the terrorist attack at the Heaton Park Hebrew Community synagogue on October 2, pressure was mounting on the royal family to go further by backing a move to formally remove Andrew from the dukedom through parliamentary legislation.

Downing Street had no comment on the matter, with the Prime Minister’s official spokesman saying the legal issue was “primarily a matter for the palace” and that ministers “support the king’s decision” on Andrew’s titles.

He added: “The Prime Minister’s thoughts are greatly concerned with the victims and survivors of Jeffrey Epstein who have suffered and continue to suffer.”

Meanwhile, the Metropolitan police were “actively” investigating allegations that Andrew had given Giuffre’s date of birth and social security number to the police protection officer in order to dig up dirt for a smear campaign, following reports in the Mail on Sunday.

A Buckingham Palace source said the new allegations were “very serious and worrying” and needed to be “appropriately investigated”.

They said action was needed because of “what lies at the heart of this, the wider allegations and the issues highlighted”.

The Mail on Sunday reported that Andrew attempted to smear Giuffre in 2011. The prince’s alleged attempt, which the officer is not said to have taken action on, occurred hours before the newspaper first published Andrew’s photo with Giuffre.

In her book, in an excerpt exclusively published by the Guardian, Giuffre repeats her claims that she was forced to have sex with the prince three times, including during an orgy when she was 17 and after being trafficked by sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Andrew vehemently denies the allegations.

Giuffre also claims that her legal case against Andrew is strengthened by the royal’s own words in a disastrous 2019 Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis, in which she insisted she had no memory of meeting Giuffre, failed to apologize for her friendship with Epstein, and failed to express any compassion for Epstein’s victims.

The immediate consequence forced him to retire from public life “for the foreseeable future.”

Giuffre wrote: “As devastating as this interview was for Prince Andrew, it was like an injection of jet fuel for my legal team.

“Not only will its contents help us build a solid case against the prince, it will also open the door to potentially subpoenaing his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson and their daughters Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie.”

“Did he really take Beatrice out for pizza on March 10, 2001, as he claimed? If we dethrone the princesses, family members could probably poke holes in his alibi,” the book reads.

“Do his medical records really show that he was experiencing a temporary case of anhidrosis (lack of sweating), which is not usually a response to adrenaline? We weren’t quite ready to file charges yet, but this interview gave us a lot more room to work than we had before.”

After pressing his case, he said the prince tried to hide at Balmoral. “Initially, the prince made it difficult for my lawyers to send him papers and fled to Queen Elizabeth’s Balmoral Castle in Scotland, where he hid behind its well-guarded gates.”

An agreement was reached in 2022 after “two days of mediation talks”. She said Giuffre read it in tears.

Andrew acknowledged that he had suffered “both as a victim of harassment and as a result of unfair public attacks.” He also praised her and other survivors for “standing up for themselves and others” and said he “never intended to disparage.” [her] character”.

She wrote: “I agreed to a one-year ban on speaking, which seemed important to the prince because it ensured that his mother’s Platinum Jubilee was not tarnished any more than it had already been.”

Giuffre said she gained “much more” than money from Andrew because “he acknowledged that I and many other women were victimized and made an implicit promise to never deny it again.”

He said he was looking forward to “using the Crown’s money to do good” and was starting to improve. Speak, Act, Reclaim (Fly) foundation combating human trafficking.

Giuffre said in her final episode: “I don’t regret it, but the constant telling and retelling has been extremely painful and tiring.

“I’m trying to save myself from my past with this book. Anyone who wants to know what’s going on now can sit down and read Nobody’s Daughter.”

After a car accident shortly before her death, Giuffre wrote in an email to her co-author Amy Wallace that it was her “sincerest wish that this work be published, regardless of my circumstances at the time” and that it would be published in the event of her death.

“The content of this book is vital because it aims to shed light on the systemic failures that enable cross-border trafficking of vulnerable individuals,” he said in his email.

Speaking to Channel 4 News on Monday night, Giuffre’s sister-in-law Amanda Roberts said the Met should “100%” reopen its investigation into Andrew.

“What else is needed? I think the cost of proof is too high for survivors, and we’ve seen that time and time again. It doesn’t matter who is accused, there is no separate law for those in power,” he said.

In response, the Met said that when it was made aware of the alleged human trafficking in 2001 it was “clear that any investigation would focus largely on activities and relationships outside the UK”. It was concluded that the Met was not the “appropriate authority” for the investigation and that a full criminal investigation would not proceed, and the decision was reviewed and approved in 2019.