Andrew Awaits His Fate

Blow to Duke as judge questions whether he can use Giuffre deal to halt sex case

- Christopher Bucktin

PRINCE Andrew was sweating last night as a judge seemed to trample all over his plan to use a settlement struck by Virginia Giuffre and Jeffrey Epstein to protect him from a civil rape case.

The Duke's lawyers yesterday appeared in a New York court via video link trying to have Ms Giuffre's civil rape case dismissed, a motion Judge Lewis Kaplan said he would rule on “pretty soon”.

Ms Giuffre is suing Andrew for unspecified damages, claiming that in 2001 she was trafficked by billionaire Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, now a convicted sex offender, to have sex with him when she was 17, a minor under US law.

The Duke, 61, absolutely and categorically” denies her allegations.

Yesterday, his legal team asserted that her lawsuit had no merit, arguing that a £370,000 settlement Ms Giuffre had made with Epstein in 2009 protected the royal from being sued.

But Judge Kaplan pointed Ms Giuffre's lawyer David Boies to a passage of the deal which stipulated Epstein and Ms Giuffre agreed that the terms of this Settlement Agreement are not intended to be used by any other person”.

The judge said: “The defendant [Prince Andrew] is any other person’ – is within the category of persons who are not entitled to use the terms of the settlement .

Mr Boies replied: “What the court is saying is that the parties explicitly, by the very terms of the settlement, preclude...The judge said: “Use by a third party?