Prince Andrew told Epstein it was ‘possible’ he was photographed with sex accuser Virginia Giuffre during 2011 MoS probe into the leaked picture but told BBC Newsnight it could have been ‘doctored’ just eight years later

Prince Andrew privately admitted to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein that he could have met his sex accuser Virginia Giuffre.

In his disastrous 2019 interview with BBC Newsnight, Andrew told interviewer Emily Maitlis that ‘categorically I don’t remember meeting her at all’.

Pressed repeatedly whether he was saying ‘categorically’ that he could not remember Ms Giuffre, Andrew replied: ‘Yep.’ He also suggested that an infamous photograph of him with his arm around Ms Giuffre’s waist could have been a crude forgery, saying: ‘Nobody can prove whether or not that photograph has been doctored but I don’t recollect that photograph ever being taken.’

In his infamous Newsnight interview Prince Andrew suggested that an infamous photograph of him with his arm around Ms Giuffre’s waist could have been a crude forgery

But in a message to Epstein on February 25, 2011, two days before the MoS published an interview with Ms Giuffre and revealed the picture, Andrew appeared to accept he could have met her. Apparently updating Epstein on the MoS’s approach to him for comment ahead of the story being published, he wrote: ‘Categoric denial of Sexual Relations. Possible that I met her in a group with others and possible there is a photograph.’

He accused the MoS of ‘just gratuitously trying it on… ably abetted by Miss Roberts [Virginia Giuffre] who they will have contacted as her identity will have been known from court records, I assume.’

The Prince added: ‘Not bothered any further about it but will keep watch.’

The revelation comes as a bombshell email obtained by this newspaper exposes how Andrew asked his taxpayer-funded Met bodyguard to investigate Virginia Giuffre and passed him her date of birth and confidential social security number.

Astonishingly, Andrew then told Ed Perkins, Queen Elizabeth’s deputy press secretary, that he had asked one of his personal protection officers – part of the Met’s elite SO14 Royalty Protection Group – to dig up information about Ms Giuffre.

He emailed Mr Perkins hours before this newspaper first published the infamous picture of the duke with 17-year-old Ms Giuffre, which would ultimately bring about his downfall.

‘It would also seem she has a criminal record in the [United] States,’ he wrote. ‘I have given her DoB [date of birth] and social security number for investigation with XXX, the on duty ppo [personal protection officer].’

It is not suggested that the officer complied with the prince’s request, while Ms Giuffre’s family last night said she did not have a criminal record.

Her relatives said our revelations ‘expose the lengths to which those implicated try to discredit and defame survivors. The truth will surface and there will be no shadows in which they can hide’.

A spokesperson for the Met told the MoS late on Saturday that they were ‘actively looking into the claims made.’ 

Details of the shocking email come after Andrew was forced to relinquish all of his remaining titles following new damaging revelations in last week’s MoS about his friendship with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. In a humiliating blow, Andrew will no longer be known as the Duke of York and is stepping down from membership of the Order of the Garter, the country’s most ancient order of chivalry.

Ms Giuffre’s family have renewed their request to the King to strip Andrew of his title of Prince, adding: ‘We also request a full investigation as to how Andrew obtained Virginia’s private information.’