9 hours ago
2
US Department of Justice via Press Association
Andrew pictured with Virginia Giuffre and Ghislaine Maxwell
Former victims' commissioner Dame Vera Baird has called for police to "start properly investigating" Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor's links with Jeffrey Epstein.
She told the BBC she had raised the former prince with the Metropolitan Police previously, but was told alleged offending linked to Epstein had primarily occurred abroad and "there wasn't much to go on" for UK investigators.
Dame Vera, who represented victims in England and Wales from 2019-2022, said the situation around Andrew had "changed very radically" in light of new evidence, as she echoed former Prime Minister Gordon Brown's calls for a police inquiry.
Andrew has previously strenuously denied any wrongdoing.
On Wednesday, Brown used an article in the New Statesman to call for the Met to "urgently" re-examine whether Epstein's victims were trafficked in and out of the UK.
In December, a BBC investigation found 87 flights linked to the convicted sex offender had arrived or departed from UK airports between the early 1990s and 2018, some with British women onboard who say they were abused by Epstein.
Brown said documents released in the US "suggest a number of British girls were on 90 Epstein flights organised from UK airports", including 15 after Epstein's 2008 conviction for a child sex offence.
References to Stansted Airport being used by Epstein's plane to transport women in and out of the UK should trigger a police investigation, the former prime minister said.
Dame Vera, who now chairs the Criminal Cases Review Commission, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that references in the documents to Stansted Airport had been "absolutely new to me".
Having raised concerns with the police while commissioner, she explained: "I [was] there to ensure our state protects victims.
"There happens to be a monarchy and on the face of it there is strong suspicion the then-son of the monarch... offers some sort of threat to victims."
She said concerns around the situation have "niggled" her since.
Dame Vera continued: "I read Gordon Brown's article yesterday and thought that added hugely to the obligation really to start properly investigating this."
The former prince has previously questioned whether the picture had been doctored and claimed he had never met Giuffre. He has not commented publicly since Maxwell's 2015 email appeared to confirm its authenticity.
She continued: "All of that reinforces the position I held when I was victims' commissioner – that it is time to investigate this and that we look quite odd if we don't."
The woman - who was in her 20s at the time - alleges the encounter happened at Andrew former residence Royal Lodge in Windsor.
Stansted Airport has previously said that all private aircraft use entirely independent terminals not operated by Stansted, and the airport does not manage or have any visibility of passenger arrangements on privately operated aircraft.
