{"id":438183,"date":"2026-02-21T16:16:08","date_gmt":"2026-02-21T16:16:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/438183\/"},"modified":"2026-02-21T16:16:08","modified_gmt":"2026-02-21T16:16:08","slug":"what-former-prince-andrews-arrest-says-about-the-royal-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/438183\/","title":{"rendered":"What Former Prince Andrew\u2019s Arrest Says About the Royal Family"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tAndrew Mountbatten-Windsor\u2019s arrest<\/a> in Norfolk, England on Thursday marked the first time in more than 350 years that a senior member of the royal family has been arrested.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThis is uncharted territory for the royal family and who knows where it\u2019s going to end,\u201d Duncan Larcombe tells Rolling Stone. Larcombe has been reporting on the British royal family<\/a> since 2004 and is the author of Prince Harry: The Inside Story. \u201cThis is something that is potentially hugely damaging, and for King Charles, it\u2019s the stuff of nightmares.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tMountbatten-Windsor\u2019s arrest is not tied to ongoing allegations of sexual misconduct on his part, but it is related to revelations in the Epstein files<\/a> that the royal sent trade reports to Jeffrey Epstein<\/a> in 2010, while he was working for the British government. Thames Valley Police arrested King Charles\u2019 brother on his 66th birthday on \u201csuspicion of misconduct in public office.\u201d He has been released under investigation, and the photograph of him leaving the police station made front page headlines across the U.K. on Friday. The impact of Mountbatten-Windsor\u2019s arrest extends beyond the U.K.\u2019s borders, however, making international news, and an Epstein investigative reporter tells Rolling Stone the arrest of a royal can be seen as a sign that, at least outside of the States, nobody is above the law.<\/p>\n

\n\tKing Charles III stripped his brother of his titles<\/a> in October following continued scrutiny over his ties to Epstein. After Mountbatten-Windsor\u2019s arrest, the British monarch released a statement saying law enforcement has the royal family\u2019s full and wholehearted support and co-operation. \u201cLet me state clearly: the law must take its course,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\n\tLarcombe says that Mountbatten-Windsor being stripped of his titles was a \u201cpreemptive strike\u201d by the royal family to create as much distance as they can from him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s an indication that [Andrew\u2019s] brother, the king, grasped how serious some of these allegations are,\u201d says Larcombe. \u201cThis sort of shows that the royals knew what was going to happen. If they\u2019re on a life raft after a shipwreck, Charles is not going to dive into the water to save his brother. Self-preservation is more important.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tLarcombe says that perhaps if the Queen were still alive, Mountbatten-Windsor would have been slightly more protected. He says he thinks Prince William has been \u201cparticularly instrumental\u201d in putting pressure on his family to separate themselves from Mountbatten-Windsor.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cWilliam\u2019s head is screwed on and he realizes just how potentially damaging this could be for the wider royal family,\u201d says Larcombe. He adds that in the U.K., King Charles, William and Catherine are all \u201cincredibly popular\u201d so he doesn\u2019t think this is the end of the royal family. This just shows they will put the institution of the family above familial ties.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThey can weather this storm, but as far as they\u2019re concerned, Andrew is now being hung out to dry,\u201d he says. \u201cThey\u2019re not going down with this sinking ship.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tLarbombe says that the numerous allegations against Mountbatten-Windsor have been around for 15 to 16 years, but the latest release of the Epstein files have been damaging because they provide British authorities with a more black and white way of investigating the royal on misconduct in public office. But, he says, in the context of British royalty, this arrest is unprecedented in modern history.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cMy jaw hit the floor,\u201d says Larcombe. \u201cIf Andrew goes to prison, it will be at his brother\u2019s pleasure,\u201d referring to the term \u201cat His Majesty\u2019s pleasure,\u201d which is used to describe a prison sentence. He says that he thinks this will be seen as a historical moment in the country.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\n\t\u201cYou\u2019ll remember where you were when you heard Prince Andrew<\/a> had been arrested.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tEpstein investigative journalist Julie K. Brown says that when she heard Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested, her first thought was of Virginia Giuffre. Giuffre, who died by suicide<\/a> last April, was one of Epstein\u2019s most prominent accusers and alleged she was forced to have sex with Mountbatten-Windsor as a teenager. She settled a high-profile sexual assault lawsuit against Mountbatten-Windsor in 2022.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cVirginia had been through so much and fought so hard for accountability, especially where the former Prince Andew was concerned,\u201d says Brown. \u201cI understand that his charge didn\u2019t have to do with sexual wrongdoing but anyone who does investigations knows that sometimes you can\u2019t make one charge stick but you can find something else to charge someone with.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt seems as though King Charles set this up so that the authorities would do the right thing,\u201d adds Brown. \u201cHe stepped back \u2014 all this time, the feeling was that Andrew was being protected, so this shows that no one is above the law. And that\u2019s been sort of the theme of this story, that there seems to be so many powerful, influential, politically-connected people who so far have been above the law.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\n\tBrown says that she thinks Andrew\u2019s arrest sends a message to Epstein survivors that the world is with them<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cEven though the Justice Department has sort of shut this down here in the U.S.,\u201d says Brown, referring to the fact that there have been no such high-profile consequences in the States, \u201cI feel like the world is with them. The public has put this on the front burner, because they\u2019re paying attention to this story. And I think that [Epstein\u2019s victims] can feel that they can feel that they have support, maybe not with our government, but with the public in general, in the world in general. And I think that that makes them feel some solace that there are at least some people in the world that believe them.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor\u2019s arrest in Norfolk, England on Thursday marked the first time in more than 350 years that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":438184,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[53037,45148,59,57,58,3365,50,2177,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-438183","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-kingdom","8":"tag-british-royal-family","9":"tag-epstein-files","10":"tag-gb","11":"tag-great-britain","12":"tag-greatbritain","13":"tag-jeffrey-epstein","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-prince-andrew","16":"tag-uk","17":"tag-united-kingdom","18":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438183","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=438183"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438183\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/438184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=438183"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=438183"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=438183"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}