Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s Life in Footage

Andrew has all the time maintained that he has no reminiscence of ever assembly Giuffre, and that he dedicated no wrongdoing in any of his relations with Epstein, who died in New York’s Metropolitan Correctional Middle in 2019, whereas awaiting trial on sex-trafficking costs. Nonetheless, in 2011, Andrew stepped down from his decade-long position as a U.Ok. international-trade envoy. In 2019, after a disastrous tv interview by which he admitted that he had “let the facet down” by his affiliation with Epstein, Andrew stepped again from royal duties.

Simply over two years later, Andrew was stripped of his royal patronages and army roles; quickly afterward, he reached a reportedly multimillion-dollar settlement with Giuffre in a civil sexual-abuse go well with, by which he admitted no legal responsibility. Final October, with the posthumous publication of Giuffre’s memoir, by which she alleged that she had had intercourse with Andrew on three events, he surrendered the usage of his title Duke of York. Then—in what would as soon as have appeared an unimaginable demotion—he was successfully stripped of his royal standing altogether, and reborn as Mr. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. For a person whose identification was constituted round a way of social superiority—in line with Lownie’s guide, if Andrew was met with inadequate deference upon coming into a room he would loudly announce, “Let’s strive that once more,” earlier than exiting and reëntering to unexpectedly carried out bows and curtsies—the discount in standing was absolutely a profound humiliation. Even Charles I, who was executed for treason in 1649, went to the scaffold as King.

Final week, Andrew spent his first birthday as a commoner in circumstances as degraded as earlier celebrations had been grand. At round eight within the morning, he was arrested at a farmhouse on the King’s Sandringham property—not in relation to any sexual offenses however on suspicion of misconduct in public workplace. The arrest apparently resulted from paperwork not too long ago disclosed by the US Division of Justice suggesting that as commerce envoy he had shared privileged data with Epstein. (Mountbatten-Windsor has, as of this writing, not been charged with any crime.) Recognized by the police as “a person in his sixties from Norfolk,” Andrew, who’s the primary senior member of the Royal Household to be arrested since Charles I, spent about eleven hours in custody earlier than being launched below investigation. Because the automotive carrying him departed the police station, a photographer captured one other indelible picture, of the previous Prince slumped within the again seat, wide-eyed and slack-jawed—the boy for whom the chimes as soon as pealed wanting very very like a person for whom the bell now tolls.

Andrew just isn’t the one extremely positioned member of the British institution whose status, on the very least, has been destroyed by an affiliation with Epstein. Peter Mandelson, the previous Ambassador to the U.S., is below investigation for passing privileged data alongside to the financier. (Mandelson has not been arrested or charged, and a report by the BBC famous its understanding that “his place is that he has not acted in any method criminally.”) That scandal has shaken an already unsteady Prime Minister Keir Starmer, regardless of Starmer’s having by no means a lot as encountered Epstein himself. “No person is above the regulation,” the Prime Minister mentioned throughout a tv interview, broadcast final week simply as Andrew was being arrested.

In Britain, on the present proof, that seems to be true: investigators have been promised the “wholehearted help” of the King, who issued a press release whereas his brother was nonetheless in custody that “the regulation should take its course.” It’s putting that, against this, no authorities within the U.S. appear keen or in a position to search comparable accountability from the highly effective males who entered Epstein’s orbit. President Trump, when requested whether or not extra former Epstein associates would possibly face arrest, replied, “Nicely, you understand, I’m the professional in a method, as a result of I’ve been completely exonerated,” deflecting the query whereas permitting that occasions had been “very, very unhappy” for the Royal Household, as if this had been a parochial affair amongst posh Brits, free from implications for an American élite. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s authorized destiny continues to be unfolding, however regardless of the future holds, the social gathering is over for him. When will or not it’s over for the remainder of them? ♦