Andrew sex accuser wants to be ‘vindicated' over claims

THE prospect of Prince Andrew avoiding harmful new revelations over the sex abuse allegations against him was diminishing today as Virginia Giuffre’s lawyer warned that she is determined to be “vindicated” in her claims against him.

-  Martin Bentham and Robert Jobson

David Boies said that Ms Giuffre, who accuses the Duke of York of sexually abusing her in New York, London and the US Virgin Islands when she was a teenager, would not accept a purely financial settlement to stop her claims being heard in court.

Instead, he said that it was “very important” to his client that “this matter be resolved in a way that vindicates her and vindicates the other victims” and predicted that there is a “good” likelihood of a trial going ahead later this year as planned at which Andrew’s defence would be put under scrutiny.

“His approach has been to deny, deny, deny, to blame Virginia, criticise her, attack her morals, attack her credibility, and we’ll see how all that plays out when he’s under oath.”

Mr Boies added that “additional evidence is coming out all the time” and that the “next step for sure” will be “the taking of evidence from Prince Andrew”, his client and witnesses. The prince has denied meeting Ms Giuffre and strongly denies any wrongdoing.

The comments from Mr Boies follow the decision by New York judge Lewis Kaplan to reject Prince Andrew’s attempt to have Ms Giuffre’s lawsuit against him thrown out.