Associated Press/Steve Parsons
- Virginia Roberts Giuffre sued Prince Andrew in August for alleged sexual assault.
- Prince Andrew has denied Giuffre’s allegations that he sexually assaulted her when she was 17.
- His lawyers tried to dismiss the case in a New York Court on Friday, CNN reported.
Lawyers for Prince Andrew have asked a US judge to dismiss a sexual assault civil case against him by Virginia Roberts Giuffre, arguing that it violated a settlement agreement with sex offender Jeffery Epstein, CNN reported.
Insider previously reported that Giuffre sued Prince Andrew in August, accusing the Duke of York of sexually assaulting her when she was 17.
In the lawsuit, Giuffre said the royal, alongside Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, forced her to have sexual intercourse with him against her will in London, New York, and the US Virgin Islands, Insider’s Rebecca Cohen and Erin Snodgrass reported.
Giuffre also alleged that Prince Andrew knew she was a minor when the events occurred.
He has previously denied Giuffre’s allegations.
“Virginia Giuffre may well be a victim of sexual abuse at the hands of Jeffrey Epstein … and nothing can excuse, nor fully capture, the abhorrence and gravity of Epstein’s monstrous behavior against Giuffre, if so,” Andrew’s attorneys wrote in a court filing on Friday, CNN reported. “However, and without diminishing the harm suffered as a result of Epstein’s alleged misconduct, Prince Andrew never sexually abused or assaulted Giuffre.”
Epstein was arrested in July 2019. He died by suicide in jail in Manhattan in August 2019 awaiting trial for sex trafficking and conspiracy charges.
Maxwell was arrested in July 2020 was also charged with sex-trafficking crimes by US prosecutors. Maxwell is awaiting a trial scheduled to start in November and is currently detained at Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Center.
Reuters reported that on Friday, Prince Andrew called Giuffre’s lawsuit against him “baseless” and said it was an attempt to “achieve another payday.”
“Accusing a member of the world’s best known royal family of serious misconduct has helped Giuffre create a media frenzy online and in the traditional press,” the filing said, according to CNN. “Epstein’s abuse of Giuffre does not justify her public campaign against Prince Andrew.”
Reuters reported that Giuffre and Epstein signed a settlement in 2009 that released Epstein and several other people from any claims made against them. Andrew’s lawyers argued he was included in that release. Forbes reported that Prince Andrews lawyers were granted permission to review that settlement earlier this month.
David Boies, a lawyer for Giuffre, told Reuters that the settlement “on its face” applied to people involved in litigation in Florida, so it doesn’t include Andrew.
“Prince Andrew’s attempt now to use the 2009 release as a get out of jail free card shows how desperate he is to dodge and duck the facts of what he did,” Boies said.
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