Virginia Giuffre: What is known about woman who has accused Prince Andrew of sexual abuse?

US citizen Virginia Giuffre has alleged that disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein trafficked her and forced her to have sexual intercourse with his friends including UK Queen Elizabeth II’s second son, Prince Andrew. Apart from Epstein’s sex trafficking victim, Giuffre has emerged as centre of one of world’s most high-profile legal battles in world as she launched a civil case against Duke of York. Even though royal has repeatedly denied Giuffre’s allegations, Prince Andrew’s lawyer’s efforts to have case thrown out at preliminary st have failed. w civil trial in New York is set to take place this autumn.

What is kwn about Virginia Giuffre?

Giuffre was born in California, United States in 1983 as Virginia Roberts. According to BBC, her family later relocated to Florida. She has told BBC Parama in 2019 that at of seven, she was sexually abused by a family friend and her “childhood was taken away”. She also said, “I was just so mentally scarred already at such a young , and I ran away from that."

Later in childhood, she is also kwn to have been in and out of foster care. According to report, by of 14, she was living on streets where she found “hunger and pain and [more] abuse”. Virginia finally met British socialite Ghislaine Maxwell in 2000 when she was attempting to rebuild her life. It is kwn that Giuffre was working as a locker room attendant at former US President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach.

Giuffre has reportedly said that Maxwell, who is w convicted of grooming young girls to be sexually abused and trafficked by Epstein, offered her an interview for chance to train as a mass rapist. While recalling incident, she was quoted by BBC as saying, “I ran over to my dad who works on tennis courts at Mar-a-Lago, and he kws I'm trying to fix my life up at that point, which is why he got me job re. I said: 'You're t going to believe it dad'."

Giuffre’s meeting with Epstein and Maxwell

Giuffre has claimed that when she arrived at Epstein’s Palm Beach home in Florida, disgraced financier was lying down naked and young Giuffre was instructed by Maxwell on how to mass him. Giuffre told BBC, “Through that time y were asking me questions about who I was. y seemed like nice people so I trusted m, and I told m I'd had a really hard time in my life up until n - I'd been a runaway, I'd been sexually abused, physically abused… That was worst thing I could have told m because w y knew how vulnerable I was.”

However, what Giuffre expected to be a job interview soon turned into start of abuse which was going to last for several years. In 2015, Giuffre had filed a defamation case against Maxwell after she was accused American of being a liar. case has since been settled. 

It is pertinent to te here that while Epstein was found dead in his jail cell while awaiting trial for sexually abusing under girls and also trafficking m, Maxwell was found guilty last month of recruiting and trafficking young girls for Epstein abuse. While Giuffre was referenced several times during Maxwell’s sex-trafficking trial, she was t one of four women who testified in New York court.

Allegations against Prince Andrew 

In years that Giuffre was associated with Epstein and Maxwell, she said that she went from being abused by disgraced financier to being “passed around like a platter of fruit" among his or influential associates. While Giuffre was being taken around on private jets, at of 17 in 2001, she has said that Epstein brought her to London to meet Prince Andrew. A photograph showing her younger self with Prince Andrew’s arm around her waist and Maxwell also in frame was clicked by Epstein as per Giuffre’s request, she said. However, after going to a nightclub, Giuffre said that she was told by Maxwell that she “had to do for Andrew what I do for Jeffrey”.

Giuffre told BBC, “It was a really scary time in my life… I wasn't chained to a sink, but se powerful people were my chains”. Giuffre filed a civil case against Duke of York alleging that Queen’s second son sexually abused her three times at Maxwell’s London home that night following by at Epstein’s homes in Manhattan and Little St James in Virgin Islands. 

However, Prince Andrew told BBC Newsnight in 2019 that he had recollection of ever meeting Giuffre and said that her alleged sexual abuse in US and UK by him “didn’t happen”. Eventually, Giuffre told Miami Herald that by 2003. Epstein had lost interest in her because she was too old for him.

How has case impacted Prince Andrew?

Recently, in latest blow for royal family, a US judge ruled that Giuffre;’s civil lawsuit against Prince Andrew would go for trial. It is expected to have major ramifications for Buckingham Palace as long-time running allegations against 61-year-old Prince would be tested in court after significantly tarnishing his public im. He even had to step back from royal duties in late 2019.