How do Prince Andrew and Virginia Giuffre's 'abuse' accounts differ?

How do Prince Andrew and Virginia Giuffre's 'abuse' accounts differ?

Pressure continues to mount on Prince Andrew after the woman who alleges she was forced to have sex with him as a teenager gave her account to the BBC.

The Duke of York denies the allegations from Virginia Giuffre, who claims she was trafficked by paedophile Jeffrey Epstein, a friend of Andrew’s.

Her interview with Panorama on Monday night follows the duke’s interview with Newsnight, widely seen as a disaster, in which he said he could not remember meeting Ms Giuffre - formerly known as Virginia Roberts and referred to in the programme as such.

Here is how their accounts differ.

Virginia Giuffre claims to have met Prince Andrew in London

Ms Giuffre claims she was brought to London by Epstein in 2001, introduced to Prince Andrew, and was taken to Tramp nightclub.

She says Andrew offered her a drink and asked her to dance.

She said: “We went into the VIP section. There was no waiting in the lines obviously – you were with a prince.

“Andrew asked me what I wanted to drink, you know, and I said oh, you know, something from the bar. He had something clear. I know mine was vodka … and then he asked me to dance.”

Prince Andrew said it “didn’t happen” and he has “no recollection of ever meeting this lady, none whatsoever”.

He has claimed he could not have gone to Tramp with her because on that evening he had taken his eldest daughter, Princess Beatrice, to Pizza Express in Woking and was then at home with the children.

Prince Andrew ‘sweated’ at Tramp nightclub

Ms Giuffre described Andrew as “the most hideous dancer I have ever seen in my life” and said he sweated all over her in Tramp.

She added: “I mean it was horrible, and this guy was sweating all over me.... it was raining basically everywhere, I was just grossed out from it, but I knew I had to keep him happy because that’s what Jeffrey and Ghislaine (Maxwell, Epstein’s partner and Prince Andrew’s friend) would have expected from me.”

But in his recent Newsnight interview, Andrew claimed he had a medical condition which meant he did not sweat.

He said: “There’s a slight problem with the sweating because I have a peculiar medical condition which is that I don’t sweat, or I didn’t sweat at the time.

“I didn’t sweat at the time because I had suffered what I would describe as an overdose of adrenaline in the Falklands War, when I was shot at, and I simply… it was almost impossible for me to sweat.”

Virginia Giuffre claims to have had sex with Prince Andrew in Belgravia

Ms Giuffre claims that when they left Tramp, Ms Maxwell spoke to her on the drive to her house in Belgravia.

“In the car Ghislaine tells me that I have to do for Andrew what I do for Jeffrey, and that just made me sick,” Ms Giuffre said.

She says that later that evening, she had sex with the duke upstairs at Ms Maxwell’s house.

Prince Andrew has said he did not have sex with her on that night or any other time.

When asked if it could have been on another date, he said: “It didn’t happen.”

The photograph of Prince Andrew and Virginia Giuffre

Much focus has been placed on a photo that appears to show the duke with his arm around Ms Giuffre.

She said people were coming up with “ridiculous excuses” to explain it, and told Panorama it was genuine and that she had given the original to the FBI in 2011.

She added: “The people on the inside are going to keep coming up with these ridiculous excuses, like his arm was elongated or the photo was doctored.

“I mean I’m calling BS on this. He knows what happened, I know what happened.

“And there’s only one of us telling the truth.”

Virginia Giuffre speaking to Panorama. (BBC)
Virginia Giuffre speaking to Panorama. (BBC)

But Prince Andrew told Newsnight that he did not remember the photograph being taken, and said he could not be certain it was his hand on her.

He added: “From the investigations that we’ve done, you can’t prove whether or not that photograph is faked or not, because it is a photograph of a photograph of a photograph.

“So it’s very difficult to be able to prove it, but I don’t remember that photograph ever being taken.

“I am not one to, as it were, hug, and public displays of affection are not something that I do.

“So that’s the best explanation I can give you, and I’m afraid to say that I don’t believe that photograph was taken in the way that has been suggested.”