Jeffrey epstein

Prince Andrew's royal excommunication is complete

Prince Andrew has been well and truly cut adrift. By his only family. From birth, he was styled His Royal Highness. He will go to his grave unencumbered by it. The removal of the style HRH, at the age of 61, will hurt a son of the Queen who doesn’t wear his royal status lightly. He remains a prince and a duke, but the Falklands veteran has no military titles. The uniform of an admiral he’d asked a tailor to run up will now remain in a wardrobe. Unworn in public. His patronages are gone too. Henceforth, he’s Prince Andrew, Duke of York: the non-royal, royal This is what a

The truth about my sister, Ghislaine Maxwell

The mainstream media’s pronunciation of my sister’s name has been about as accurate as their coverage of her. No, it’s not ‘Jizlaine’, it’s ‘Giilen’. Firmly a French name, it was my mother, Betty’s riposte to my father’s choice of the name Kevin for my younger brother. My mother is all too often written out of the Maxwell story but in fact she was the major influence on all our lives. That’s partly because of her loving nature but also because my father was so seldom present in our childhood. He was an incessant traveller and his many interests kept him away. Betty was determined to maintain our French identities. We

Ian Maxwell: Ghislaine thinks Epstein was murdered

Away from the shenanigans of Westminster, the details of Ghislaine Maxwell’s ongoing trial have been filling our national newspapers this week. Images have been released of the British socialite cavorting with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein at Balmoral, the Queen’s home in Scotland, with Maxwell facing allegations that she facilitated and participated in the sexual exploitation of girls for her longtime companion. In such circumstances, Steerpike was intrigued to hear that Ian Maxwell, Ghislaine’s brother, was appearing on The Spectator’s Americano podcast to discuss the ongoing trial. Among the highlights of the episode: the businessman’s thoughts on the conspiracy theories surrounding Epstein’s reported suicide – an event which echoed the

Prince Andrew has no good options

It’s not a good look, aged 61, to be hiding behind your mother. The ninth in line to the throne joined the Queen at Balmoral, making it difficult for papers to be served in the Virginia Giuffre civil case. The Aberdeenshire estate may cover 50,000 acres, but it hasn’t provided refuge — a state of being that has eluded Andrew for the past six years. The Queen’s favourite son (and one of her blind spots) has a damaged reputation that continues to be pummelled remorselessly. It’s a process that has produced — on his part — one flawed strategy after another, from the disastrous Newsnight interview to trying to prove

The royal redemption of Prince Andrew

Seventeen months is clearly long enough, as far as Prince Andrew is concerned, to spend in the royal wilderness. While mourning the passing of his father, he’s made tentative steps to reclaim his position as one of the public faces of the House of Windsor. His private status, close to his mother, has never been under threat. His first act, on this path to redemption, was an audacious one. He gave a television interview. Emily Maitlis was nowhere in sight and it passed off without incident. Indeed, it generated positive headlines with his account of how the Queen had described the death of her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh as

Nicholas Coleridge: The Ghislaine Maxwell I knew

I have known Ghislaine Maxwell for more than 40 years, since she was a student at Balliol. I always liked her, everyone did, and I find it hard to reconcile the Ghislaine I knew with the heinous crimes of which she now stands accused. I visited her several times at Headington Hall, her family house on the edge of Oxford, when her father Robert Maxwell was at the height of his power. It was a peculiar house, rented from the council, like an enormous municipal town hall. The entrance hall and corridors were lined with at least a hundred framed cartoons by Jak and Mac of the great narcissist newspaper

How did I end up in Epstein’s little black book?

Every time Jeffrey Epstein is in the news, I start getting calls from strangers wanting to scream abuse at me. This happened a lot when the billionaire financier was found dead in his jail cell last year after being arrested on sex trafficking charges, and it has started again following the arrest of his ex-girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell a couple of weeks ago. The reason is that my contact details were in Epstein’s ‘little black book’, and whenever his name pops up some kindly soul takes it upon themselves to post a picture of the relevant page, which shows my mobile phone number, on Twitter. I may have to change my

Jeffrey Epstein really was a streak of slime

Did Jeffrey Epstein kill himself or was he murdered — and frankly who cares? Actually, having watched the four-part Netflix series — Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich — about his secretive, sordid life, I care very much. Sure, his squalid death in jail, apparently from suicide while awaiting trial for numerous sex crimes, was thoroughly deserved. But justice would have been far better served if this noisome creep had spent the rest of his days rotting in prison, deprived for ever of all sexual activity save the involuntary variety provided in the showers whenever he dropped the soap. I hadn’t expected to respond quite this viscerally to the Epstein tale. Indeed,