Woman Who Says She Was Trafficked to Prince Andrew Not Part of Ghislaine Maxwell Trial

Ghislaine Maxwell's trial starts next week, but the accuser who claimed she was trafficked to Britain's Prince Andrew among other powerful figures won't be a part of the case, the Associated Press reported.

U.S. prosecutors won't bring charges connected to Virginia Giuffre to Maxwell's trial, and she isn't expected to be called as a witness either.

Prosecutors will focus on four other women who say they were recruited by Maxwell as teenagers to be abused by Epstein. None of the other women have alleged being abused by powerful international figures as Giuffre has.

Giuffre claimed Epstein and Maxwell flew her around the world when she was 17 and 18 for sexual encounters with billionaires, politicians, royals and heads of state.

Giuffre provided the Daily Mail with a photo of herself and Andrew together in Maxwell's London townhouse, his arm around her midriff.

Witnesses, including the pilot who flew Epstein's plane and household staff, have said in depositions that they saw her regularly with Maxwell and Epstein.

While Giuffre's allegations are the most explosive against Maxwell, the prosecutors are avoiding a big risk by keeping her allegations about Andrew and other powerful figures out of the trial.

Giuffre has acknowledged getting key details wrong in her story over the years during an interview with Dateline NBC in 2019.

"When you are abused, you know your abuser," she said. "I might not have my dates right. I might not have my times right ... but I know their faces and I know what they've done to me."

For more reporting from the Associated Press, see below.

Records, witnesses and photos back up many parts of Giuffre's account of her time with Epstein, the financier who died by suicide in 2019 while jailed ahead of his own sex trafficking trial.

The men she's accused have spent years attacking her credibility. Maxwell's lawyers might have tried to have some of them testify.

Besides Andrew, Giuffre has said she was sexually trafficked to former New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson, former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, the noted lawyer Alan Dershowitz, the French modeling scout Jean Luc Brunel and billionaire Glenn Dubin, among others.

All have said her accounts are fabricated.

David Weinstein, a former federal prosecutor who's not involved in the case, said making Giuffre part of the Maxwell case could have complicated matters unnecessarily.

"There is no reason to give the defense anything to work with that can sow the seeds of reasonable doubt," Weinstein said.

Giuffre's lawyers declined an interview request, but she has stood by her allegations and repeatedly shown a willingness to go into civil court to prove them, sitting in depositions and assembling a legal team that includes one of America's most influential lawyers, David Boies.

Giuffre didn't initially identify the men involved, but in 2011 she took $160,000 from the Daily Mail for an interview in which she described meeting Prince Andrew during a trip to London with Epstein in 2001.

The British tabloid said Giuffre and Andrew danced together at a nightclub but added there was "no suggestion that there was any sexual contact between Virginia and Andrew, or that Andrew knew that Epstein paid her to have sex with his friends."

Years later, Giuffre's lawyers insisted she told the Daily Mail she had sex with Andrew, but the paper's lawyers wouldn't let it publish the claim.

She also said in a deposition that some details in the Daily Mail stories based on her paid interviews were inaccurate, including parts in which she described riding in a helicopter with Bill Clinton and flirting with Donald Trump. Those things hadn't happened, she said, though she blamed those errors on the reporter.

Records show Giuffre got her passport in early 2001 for travel to London and handwritten flight logs list a "Virginia" or a "Virginia Roberts"—Giuffre's unmarried name—as flying regularly on Epstein's jets. In May of 2001, Giuffre was photographed attending model Naomi Campbell's birthday party with Epstein in St. Tropez, France.

In 2014, Giuffre joined a new lawsuit by Epstein victims and began identifying men she'd previously accused anonymously. In it, she also claimed publicly for the first time that she'd had sex with Andrew three times: in London during her 2001 trip, at Epstein's New York mansion when she was 17 and in the Virgin Islands when she was 18.

She said Maxwell facilitated the encounters as a "madam."

Giuffre's account of spending time with Andrew in New York was backed up in part by Johanna Sjoberg, another Epstein accuser. In a deposition and an interview, she described an evening socializing with Giuffre, Maxwell, Epstein and Andrew in which the prince put his hand on her breast while they posed for a photo with a puppet made of him for a TV show.

The Associated Press does not typically identify people who say they are victims of sexual assault unless they decide to tell their stories publicly, as Giuffre and Sjoberg have done.

U.S. authorities have expressed interest in Giuffre's allegations. In 2011, FBI agents flew to Australia, where Giuffre was then living, to interview her about the alleged abuse.

U.S. prosecutors have repeatedly asked Andrew if he would submit to questioning. Weeks before Maxwell's arrest last year, the then-U.S. attorney for Manhattan, Geoffrey S. Berman, issued a statement blasting Andrew for seeking to "falsely portray himself to the public as eager and willing to cooperate."

The prince has promised cooperation but never made himself available to U.S. authorities.

If prosecutors brought criminal charges against Maxwell, Andrew, or anyone else based on Giuffre's allegations, she would likely be confronted on the stand about inconsistencies in her story.

One of the men Giuffre accused, Dershowitz, is battling her in court, calling her a "sworn liar." That litigation is ongoing. Richardson and Mitchell have said they never met her. Dubin says he has flight records and other evidence proving her allegations against him are false.

Andrew, the third child of Queen Elizabeth II, has also repeatedly denied Giuffre's allegations, most notably in a 2019 interview with BBC Newsnight in which he said that while he socialized with Epstein, he couldn't recall ever meeting Giuffre and never had sex with her.

"I can absolutely categorically tell you it never happened," he said.

Andrew challenged Giuffre's claim that he was sweating profusely as they danced in a nightclub by saying he had a medical condition that made it impossible for him to sweat.

Maxwell, in depositions, has acknowledged knowing Giuffre but said her stories about being sexually trafficked to multiple men are lies.

While Andrew isn't part of Maxwell's criminal case, Giuffre sued him this year, saying her encounters with him amounted to sexual assault.

That case is pending, meaning it is possible Giuffre will get her claims against the prince before a judge yet, even if prosecutors are staying away for now.