Page 14 QQQ Daily Mail, Thursday, August 29, 2019
THE Duke of York believes
he is at the centre of a ‘witch-
hunt’ after allegations he
slept with a 17-year-old ‘sex
slave’ gained further momen-
tum yesterday.
Friends of Prince Andrew say
‘there is not one shred of evi-
dence’ to suggest he had sex
with a teenage victim of paedo-
phile financier Jeffrey Epstein.
And they insisted his lawyers
have ‘serious doubts’ about the
veracity of the now notorious pic-
ture of the duke grinning broadly
with his arm around the bare mid-
riff of Virginia Roberts in 2001.
Andrew’s allies went on the
offensive a day after Miss Roberts
challenged him to ‘come clean’ about
his friendship with Epstein.
At a New York court on Tuesday,
she said the duke ‘knows exactly
what he has done’. And her lawyers
last night reaffirmed their belief that
the photograph of Andrew and Miss
Roberts was real, saying the ‘FBI has
never questioned its authenticity’.
But in some of the strongest rebut-
tals to date, sources close to Andrew
said the allegations ‘feel like a witch-
hunt with absolutely no evidence’ of
any wrongdoing. One ally said defi-
antly: ‘Yes, he does know exactly
the source said. ‘One should ask if
Miss Roberts, now Giuffre, believed
this, why did she not say something
in 2011 when this all first started?’
Andrew’s lawyers have repeatedly
asked to be shown the original pho-
tograph of him with Miss Roberts,
which has become the defining image
of the scandal.
One source said the prince has
‘absolutely no recollection’ of the
picture ever being taken. The ally
added: ‘I understand his legal team
have asked to have proper sight of
the original photograph so they can
carry out their own investigation as
they seriously doubt its veracity.’
But last night one of Miss Roberts’
lawyers, Sigrid McCawley, said: ‘The
photograph of Prince Andrew grab-
bing 17-year-old Virginia Robert’s
waist in Ghislaine Maxwell’s town-
house is real.
‘The photograph is presently held
in the FBI’s files as indicated on the
redacted FBI form that was recently
unsealed by the Second Circuit Court
of Appeals in New York. The FBI has
never questioned its authenticity.’
Among documents recently unsealed
was a form written by an FBI agent
after Miss Roberts was interviewed in
March 2011. The form states that FBI
agents collected 20 original photo-
graphs from her which are understood
to include the one of Prince Andrew.
Another of Miss Roberts’ lawyers
David Boies, told Sky News: ‘Contin-
uing to delay and obfuscate I don’t
think really is in [Andrew’s] interest
because this is not going away.’
The duke, who continued to frater-
nise with Epstein even after he was
let out of prison for sex offences, has
said he is ‘appalled’ by Epstein’s
alleged offences and has insisted he
himself has done nothing wrong.Duke is the
victim of a
‘witch-hunt’
say his allies
down her meeting with Trump.
In a 2004 interview she said: ‘I
met Donald Trump in New York
at a Bulgari party. We chatted
and I was genuinely flattered.’
Trump’s lawyers maintain he
was unaware of any wrongdoing
by Epstein and the President
has said he was ‘not a fan’ of him.
Anouska has spoken about
Trump favourably, the last time
in a 2008 interview with OK!
magazine when she said: ‘We’re
friends now and I attended his
wedding. He’s adorable, he’s
been so kind to me. He’s such a
generous-spirited person.’
Another of Epstein’s alleged
victims has recalled her time at
the President’s Mar-a-Lago club
but in very different circum-
stances. Epstein owned a man-
sion in Palm Beach not far from
the Trump resort and his main
accuser Virginia Roberts says
she was recruited into sexual
slavery aged 15 by Maxwell while
working there as a towel girl.
Maxwell denies any wrongdoing.
The men Anouska has been
linked to are varied. Delve into
her romantic past and you find a
relationship of several months
with Baywatch star David Has-
selhoff in 2010 and another with
TV star Russell Brand in 2012.
Back in 2002, she was stepping
out with Simply Red star Mick
Hucknall and in 2003 US actor
and TV presenter Jared Leto. In
2005 she was linked to million-
aire Australian businessman
Wayne Sharpe, as well as media
company boss David Fischer and
private jet entrepreneur Rob
Hersov. The following year shewas said to have dated Blue
singer Lee Ryan and Prison
Break actor Amaury Nolasco.
She has also been married to
Chelsea restaurateur Riccardo
Mariti and once shared a flat in
Notting Hill with Formula One
driver Burgo Wharton.
She also once crossed paths
with Harvey Weinstein at the
Mayfair restaurant Cipriani. She
later recalled how she didn’t rec-
ognise him, mistaking him for a
jobbing actor she thought was
called ‘Harry Winstone’.
‘I asked him what he did and
he said: “I’m in the movies.” I
said: “Wow, so am I! We should
meet up some time. I know loads
of people out in LA!” At this
point, he very sweetly smiled and
turned away. Only later did my
friend explain who he was.’A
S the daughter of
multi-millionaire fin-
ancier Anthony de
Georgiou and former
debutante Barbara, life has been
a social whirlwind for Anouska
almost since her birth in 1977.
Her parents divorced when she
was ten and she grew up with
her mother, dividing her time
between the Cap d’Antibes in
the south of France – where she
attended school until her teens- and Belgravia in London where
her mother ran a jewellery busi-
ness. ‘As a child, I would watch
my mother who was, and is, a
very beautiful woman, and I
would see the attention she’d
get,’ she said in 2004. ‘I would
think to myself, “I want that”.’
There is little doubt that her
dream came true. As a 17-year-
old she entered the world of
modelling while dating Robert
Hanson, 17 years her senior, the
son of the late business tycoon
Lord Hanson. It was during a
party at his house in Gloucester-
shire that she met Plum Sykes,
the fashion journalist and social-
ite who introduced her to the
late fashion designer Isabella
Blow – and her career took off
from there.
‘I was in the right place at the
right time among a pretty select
crowd,’ Anouska said in 2002,
‘but that’s not to say I wouldn’t
have made it on my own. While I
was lucky to meet Isabella, I was
also incredibly ambitious and
grasped my opportunities.’
She was signed to the agency
Models One and for her first cat-
walk show, aged 18, at Paris
Fashion Week, she was dressed
in a see-through outfit.
From the late 1990s onwards,
her blonde bombshell looks
meant she was rarely out of work- or out of newspaper gossip col-
umns. She lapped up more
attention when she briefly
appeared naked alongside Jude
Law in the 2004 remake of Alfie.
On the back of that she was
also commissioned to take part
W
HEN she left Marlborough
College with a clutch of
respectable A-levels under
her belt, Anouska de Geor-
giou briefly thought about
applying to Oxford to study law but de-
cided to focus instead on pursuing her
dreams of Hollywood stardom.
The years that followed – nearly a quarter of
a century to date – have certainly been event-
ful and not always kind to the privately edu-
cated actress, model and socialite who briefly
crossed paths with the Duchess of Cambridge
while at school and now lives in the US.
In the past, she has spoken of the terrible price
she paid for years spent in the unforgiving, shallow
and exploitative world of modelling.
‘You are just a commodity,’ she said in a 2004
interview. ‘Only a handful of models are actually
very successful and the rest of the girls often have
their lives destroyed. I certainly haven’t come
through modelling unscathed.’
Standing up in a Manhattan courtroom on Tues-
day alongside 15 other women, the 42-year-old
mother-of-one became the first Briton to add her
voice to claims of abuse at the hands of the late US
billionaire Jeffrey Epstein.
‘I was a victim and it has taken me many, many
years to stand here and say, yes, it was me,’ she
said. ‘I will not remain a victim and be silent for
one more day.’
Anouska gave no details about how or when she’d
met Epstein or the nature of the abuse but the
brief statement she gave while addressing Judge
Richard Berman in New York was just the tip of
what may yet prove to be a very explosive iceberg
indeed. For millionaire’s daughter Anouska, as the
Mail can reveal, has dated some of the world’s rich-
est, most powerful and famous men.
Among those she crossed paths with, if several
newspaper articles stretching back to the late
1990s are correct, is US President Donald Trump.
Anouska is said to have met the then 50-year-old
property developer at a Manhattan party in 1997
after he had separated from his wife Marla Maples.
She was then 20 years old and attended the event
with Robert Maxwell’s daughter Ghislaine, a close
friend and former lover of Epstein’s.
An article published in 1997 under the headline
‘Trump’s Brit of alright’ reported: ‘After their meet-
ing, Trump flew Madam Maxwell and the model
south to the sunshine state [to his estate at Mar-
a-Lago in Florida] where all three enjoyed a happy
weekend together.’
In later years, Anouska appears to have playedBy Barbara
Davies
ANDREW IN
THE FRAME
From Arthur Martin
in New York
‘Immaterial and
impertinent’SEE FOLLOWING PAGES
Old pals: Prince Andrew walking
with Jeffrey Epstein in New YorkPRINCE AND THE PAEDOPHILE
what he’s done... nothing.’ Andrew
has faced repeated allegations that
he had sex three times with a 17-
year-old Miss Roberts, who is now a
36-year-old married mother of three
called Virginia Roberts Giuffre.
Prince Andrew strenuously denies
the allegations of ‘impropriety with
underage minors’ as ‘categorically
untrue’. And royal sources yesterday
insisted Andrew did not remember
ever meeting Miss Roberts.
‘Her claims are categorically untrue,’
a source told the Evening Standard.
‘Sadly, if you go through her testi-
mony there are so many inconsisten-
cies. The judge said five years ago
that testimony was immaterial and
impertinent to any application, and
should be stricken. There was not one
shred of evidence incriminating the
duke then and nothing has changed.’
The source also dismissed claims
that Miss Roberts went to Tramp
nightclub in London with the duke
where he drank cocktails. ‘The duke
doesn’t drink, he is teetotal, anyone
who really knows him knows that,’
Former flames: Anouska with David
Hasselhoff, top, and Mick Hucknall, above