LONDON, 2 November (H.S.) Newly released emails have revealed that the former Duke of York, Andrew Mountbatten Windsor, told convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein it would be good to catch up in person just months after Epstein’s release from jail for sex crimes involving a minor. The correspondence was made public on Friday, adding to the mounting pressure on the Royal Family over the disgraced royal's ties to the financier.
The emails, dated April 15, 2010, show Epstein suggesting that Andrew meet with Jes Staley, a former JPMorgan Chase executive. In his reply, Andrew wrote, I have no immediate plans to drop by New York but I think I should at some stage soon. I'll look and see if I can make a couple of days before the summer. It would be good to catch up in person.”
The two were later photographed together in New York's Central Park in December of that year.These revelations come just two days after Buckingham Palace stripped Andrew of his titles and removed him from the official roll of the peerage. The Palace has been under increasing pressure to distance itself from Andrew, particularly following the publication of a memoir by Virginia Giuffre, who alleged she was forced to have sex with Andrew on multiple occasions when she was a teenager as part of Epstein's sex trafficking ring.
Andrew has consistently denied these claims. Giuffre died by suicide in April at the age of 41.The emails were part of unsealed court filings from a 2023 lawsuit between the US Virgin Islands and JPMorgan.
The bank was sued over its alleged dealings with Epstein, who owned a private island in the territory. While JPMorgan denied wrongdoing, it later settled the case without admitting liability. The court filings also disclosed that the bank had flagged over $1 billion in transactions linked to Epstein that may have been connected to human trafficking.
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Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar
