In a surprise move, the United States Attorneys Office in New York has invoked the Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty, or MLAT, to demand an interview with Prince Andrew, Duke of York, in relation to the investigation of Jeffrey Epstein’s history of sexual abuse. While Prince Andrew pledged to cooperate in every way, U.S. Attorney Geoffrey Berman insisted that he has not assisted in any way with the investigation. The use of the MLAT to subpoena the testimony of a Royal family member is nothing short of breathtaking as a development. The assumption was that any real criminal inquiry died with Epstein. That is clearly not the case.
Berman stated “Contrary to Prince Andrew’s very public offer to cooperate with our investigation into Epstein’s co-conspirators, an offer that was conveyed via press release, Prince Andrew has now completely shut the door on voluntary cooperation.”
In his ill-considered and much criticized interview with the BBC in the fall, Andrew categorically denied allegations that he had sex with Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who claims that she was trafficked by Epstein when she was 17. She alleges that she was ordered have sexual relations with the prince.
The request could facilitate an actual appearance in a court for testimony as well as production of documents and pictures.
Article 1 of the MLAT between the two countries states:
1. The Parties shall provide mutual assistance, in accordance with the provisions of this Treaty, for the purpose of proceedings as defined in Article 19 of this Treaty. 2. Assistance shall include: (a) taking the testimony or statements of persons; (b) providing documents, records, and evidence; (c) serving documents; (d) locating or identifying persons; (e) transferring persons in custody for testimony (or other purposes); (f) executing requests for searches and seizures; (g) identifying, tracing, freezing, seizing, and forfeiting the proceeds and instrumentalities of crime and assistance in related proceedings; and (h) such other assistance as may be agreed between Central Authorities.
The stakes could now be considerably higher for Prince Andrew if he is to appear under oath. His earlier rambling and conflicted interview was comical to many but it could now be criminal to Prince Andrew if he gives false or misleading answers.
What is clear is that such an appearance will be a bonanza for the media which has been clamoring for this moment, even in the midst of protests and riots around the world. The media is likely to echo the sentiment of Gloucester in Richard III that “Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of York.”
A person of interest in the investigation of systematic breaches of Federal law protecting minors from human trafficking and sexual exploitation ceased to cooperate in that investigation. His last name being Windsor shouldn’t matter any more than if Scotland Yard were having trouble getting someone whose last name was Trump to cooperate in a similar investigation.
Raise your hand if you think this alleged incident deserves all this attention? Raise your hand if you believe the Prince did not have sex w/Guiffre?
I never assumed the Geoffrey Berman investigation would end when Epstein died. It was organized jail-bait sex parties, with a panoply of facilitators and pedophile guests. The 2009 NPA was corruptly attained (the Judge broke the law), and should be invalidated. They all deserve investigation and where merited, prosecution.
What is a “prince”?
Purple Rain….. Purple Rain.
They don’t call him Randy Andy for nothing.
federal criminal prosecution jurisdiction lies in the sex trafficking sphere, not the consent sphere. it might not matter that much what her age was
then there may also be one of these FBI “intelligence operations’ happening or more than one, intersecting with this thing or maybe at odds with it. obviously we now know that sometimes agencies are in conflict and even factions inside agencies are in conflict.
and Epstein himself may have been an asset, which is why he got the easy deal
let the Prince’s head roll for all I care.
Mr Kurtz – the Good Prince Andrew has also made many many trips on the Lolita Express and made many many trips to Lolita Island.
Which is located on what part of the United States? Answer. It’s not. Well then what does the law in that country say? I don’t care a fig about USA law when I am in another country but I pay close attention to their laws?
Michael Aarethun – not sure, but I think they are working on the sex trafficking angle of the larger case.
After the wall came down that trade was for the most part kept inside places like Russia and Ukraine until our side interfered with people trying to feed their families. THEN trafficking across the Black Sea down to places like Dubai began.Contract girls? Some the rest are bought and sold. The ones who caused that change? US law enforcement. Didn’t take much to walk up and down the street and find that out. Same outside the bases and forts we maintain or the ports of one kind or another. The duplicity of the anti trafficking mandatory classes and the real life outcome reminded me of Rachel Carson one of our most famous mass murderers who took away DDT and left disease carrying insects of crop eating insects. Neither one cared anything about ‘people’
DDT is a neurotoxin, endocrine disruptor, hepatoxin and possible carcinogen in humans, not to mention what it does to animals, birds and insects.
Very Close attention. The Constitution too often ignored in our own country and the myth of rights disappears before you cross the border or reach the 100 mile internal limit or the offshore version.
A lowly United States Attorney going after British royalty? Good luck with that.
You heard it here first: Prince Andrew did not kill himself.
No such luck
Too soon: It has to be determined what he will say before the particular method of Arnkencide can be decide upon. Cart before the horse and all.
Did Prince Andrew have intimate relations with Giuffre, did Epstein force her to do it, and if Andrew did sleep with her, was he aware it was against her will?
The age of consent in NY is 17, and in the UK it is 16. In the eyes of the law, to my understanding, she was not a minor.
Epstein was rather infamous for grooming girls, getting them to go along with what he wanted. If Giuffre did sleep with Andrew, was she forced against her will? Threatened? Held at knife point? Because what I have observed is that the usual lure is to entice teens to hang out with the rich and famous. Maybe you’ll become a girlfriend or a wife! A princess! Do you love the Princess Diaries, because that could be you! They’ll buy you presents! You’ll get to hang out on their yacht and take selfies! It is a form of insidious manipulation, in which no external force or threats are used. Rather, their minds are worked upon.
Then, later, they realize they were used and feel ashamed and dirty.
You see this a lot in CA, the land of movie stars and the rich. Young women want to get close to the powerful. Some are gold diggers, angling to be courtesans. Others want to marry only the best, and have absolutely no idea that they are pigeon holing themselves as cheap and easy. Some allow themselves to be seduced by individuals or, worst case scenarios, by the pimps like Epstein.
You know that movie trope, with the rich tycoons on yachts with bikini clad young women? There is a reason for that cliche. The original Overboard movie comes to mind, when Staton caroused with women while he abandoned his wife to Kurt Russel.
You see a baby form of it in clubs. Promoters are paid to get beautiful young women to go to clubs, as all the hot clubs have way more women than men. That’s what makes men want to go drop money there. If you know the promoter or bouncer, you never have to wait behind a velvet rope. The best promoters have a line on beautiful women that he can produce on demand. That’s just window dressing, however. It’s fun for the women because they get in free to hot clubs. Epstein, now, he took that and turned it into something truly ugly.
If Epstein manipulated Giuffre to sleep with Prince Andrew, should Andrew be held accountable? It will embarrass him for years, but would Andrew have any idea what had been said to Giuffre? That infamous photo shows a beaming Giuffre, who looks excited to be standing next to a real prince. Would many of these men realize that anything beyond the usual gold digger was going on?
I find the whole industry of manipulation and ruination of girls to be extremely sad.
In the Netflex series about Epstein, Giuffre talks about her meeting with Prince Andrew. She alleges it was in London in Maxwell’s town house and that she had someone take the photograph of her with the prince. She makes no mention of Epstein being present. She alleges that Maxwell told her to have sex with Andrew, not Epstein. Bear in mind that Giuffre was Epstein’s employee. She was hired by Maxwell when she saw her at Donald Trump’s Florida hotel, where her father was employed. She was reading a book on massage and Maxwell asked her if she’d be interested in a job. There is some question of her age at the time. She claims she was sixteen but her birth records indicate she was older. Personally, I don’t find her claims to be reliable. A communications man who worked for Epstein at his Virgin Islands retreat claims to have seen Giuffre and the prince cavorting at the pool but that’s hearsay. She makes a lot of claims but none have been proven and never will be since there will never be a trial.
semcgownjr – in the infamous TV interview, after denying knowing Guiffre and then being shown the photo of her in the London pad, Andrew says “I was never upstairs. That picture was clearly taken upstairs.” Hmmmm?????
But is it illegal. And who is the biggest promoter of what in the USA may be illicit sex? Ever been in the military? Ever get a mandatory class on VD or trafficking? What’s the first thing normally found just outside the gates of the base?
If not the actual building for that activity it’s guides and taxis. Crete and the US Navy Docks it’s taxis to American Alley NOT Off limits downstairs normal bar upstairs contract girls from other countries. Yet everyone had been given the meaningless training. So who was promoting that activity? The US Government under, at that time President Obama. Same thing no matter who is sitting in the office. Including certain areas of Washington DC
The whole thing is a joke. Cabo San Lucas by the yacht docks. ATMs spitting out US twenties and very young opportunities with T Shirts that say, Wink if you Want Me. Because the second easiest place is hot vacation spot. Difference? Tourist Gringos don’t get a class on VD or dangers of drug dealing.
So harrasing someone for doing what is legal in a third country is just part and parcel of supporting the regressive party and it is oh so liberal to talk out of one side of your mouth and act out a lie from the other side.
First line from Shakespeare’s tragedy of Richard III misquoted, although it does make some sense in the current context, thinking of Andrew, the Duke of York. Here is the correct quote in the first paragraph of the play, declaimed by Richard, then Duke of Gloucester:
Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of York;
And all the clouds that lour’d upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths;
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;
Our stern alarums changed to merry meetings,
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged war hath smooth’d his wrinkled front;
And now, instead of mounting barded steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
He capers nimbly in a lady’s chamber
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
Richard III (1.1)
Firstly, the house to which Richard belonged to, along with his brother Edward, who succeeded in becoming England’s King Edward IV at the time of the opening of the play, was known as York, in opposition to that of Lancaster, which was the house of the previous king, Henry VI. Secondly, the “Sun” (that is, the heavenly body) was Edward’s personal emblem. So in the quote, Richard is celebrating that “the winter of our discontent” (while Henry VI was king) was made “glorious Summer” by “this Sun of York” (referring to Edward, who becomes King Edward IV). Of course, it is also possible that it was actually a pun by Shakespeare, bringing to mind to Edward as a “Son” of York, but that’s not what is written, so that would be merely a secondary possibility.
Shakespeare’s lines were written to be spoken. So the homonym son/sun was very much intended.
Andrew is a member of the house of Windsor. He would be a son of Windsor.
He should have told them he came from New York.
Where did she allegedly have sex with him and what is the age of consent in that jurisdiction?
MofoKnows – according to the girl, she was 17 and 18 is the age of consent when the age difference is that great.
In London, where the age of consent is 16. In New York, where it is 17 and on Epstein’s island, where it is 18. Today’s Sun says she was 17 in London and 18 on the island. Several papers have reported that the time in London was the first time they had sex. If the reporting is accurate, she was of the age of consent in each jurisdiction when they had sex. Andrew could have been lying in the car crash interview because it looks so bad rather than because he committed a crime.
Lèse-molesté
Talk about “White Privilege,” this Royal and his friends the Clintons are supreme examples of how our Laws will be manipulated by the rich and famous, especially the Crown of England. The fact this sick pervert craves young girls would have been summarily overlooked in previous generations. Only because of modern media are we even aware of these crimes! No wonder the entire Royal Family is taxed so much in the media for covering for the Prince. It is my opinion that with the entitled and outspoken newbie, Markle, and this being the biggest controversy to surround the Royal Family ever is the reason why Prince Harry was distanced so quickly and completely from the core of the Royals. The Queen is never going to denounce her sons, nor cease to shelter them in every way. Because Prince Harry and his wifey-come-lately are so forthright and opinionated it is a severe risk that they would speak out against Perverted Prince Andrew and therefore were eschewed as quickly as possible. There is a reason why Prince Harry and Markle are living in LA and not England now and it is so the Queen can better protect her errant son from their criticism.
“White Privilege”? That’s your explanation!
Lefties are so sick in the head.
Harry is Diana’s son, and no doubt has a very good idea of how she really died.
Let us hope he does not meet the fate of JFK Jr., who had similar knowledge.
“Andrew categorically denied allegations that he had sex with Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who claims that she was trafficked by Epstein when she was 17. She alleges that she was ordered have sexual relations with the prince.”
If she was 17, then she was old enough. No different than any other sex-worker who has sex with people they do not like.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
The customer is always right!
Too bad you have to state the obvious but then the second obvious comment is who besides that one individual backed up her comment and claim. Oh yes it’s guilty until proven innocent in the word of the ACLUeless who have now become consistently left wing fanatics. Probable Cause? Never heard of it. What is a Constitution? Never heard of it. so much for what happens when former citizens take an oath of office then break their word. That bunch can’t be trusted.
His interview showed, even to a rank amateur, that he was hiding knowledge about Epstein. He has been shown to have lied, lied, lied during that interview. Go get him and bring him to the US. We need to hang a Royal!!! 😉
There is an online “release” by some Brit who works in some palace who quotes the Prince as saying:. “Pork em if ya got em.”