The arrest of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor on Thursday, his 66th birthday, is the latest development in the yearslong controversy over his ties to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Here’s how it unfolded:
• 2011: After a decade serving as trade envoy, tasked with promoting British business interests abroad, Buckingham Palace confirmed that Andrew would step down from the role. Mountbatten-Windsor, then the Duke of York, had come under severe criticism due to his friendship with Epstein, who had been convicted in 2008 for soliciting prostitution from a minor.
• 2019: Mountbatten-Windsor agreed to a long, sit-down interview with BBC Newsnight about his ties to Epstein. He said he traveled to New York in 2010 to end his friendship with the financier. Asked why that led to him staying at Epstein’s mansion for several days, Andrew said “it was a convenient place to stay,” and that he thought speaking with Epstein in person was “the honorable and right thing to do.” He admitted that his judgment may have been colored by his “tendency to be too honorable.”
Mountbatten-Windsor also said he had “no recollection of ever meeting” meeting Virginia Giuffre, who would later accuse the royal of having sex with her three times when she was a teenager. Mountbatten-Windsor suggested that a photo from 2001 showing himself and Giuffre in Ghislaine Maxwell’s house may have been faked.
• 2022: Giuffre sued Mountbatten-Windsor in a New York court in 2021, accusing him of sexual assault. Despite claiming never to have met her, the royal reportedly paid millions of dollars to Giuffre in 2022 to settle the case, without admitting any responsibility of wrongdoing.
• April 2025: Giuffre died by suicide.
• October 2025: King Charles III stripped his younger brother of his title as prince and began the process of evicting him from the royal estate at Windsor. Prince Andrew became Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor.
• January 2026: The US Department of Justice’s release of a trove of documents related to its investigation into Epstein raised further questions about Mountbatten-Windsor’s dealings with the financier.
• February 2026: The royal was arrested Thursday on suspicion of misconduct in public office.
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