Prince Andrew.
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Prince Andrew wants to overturn his settlement with Virginia Giuffre, according to news reports.
Legal experts told Insider setting aside settlements is not unprecedented.
But the experts said it’s a hard process and one Andrew is unlikely to win.
Over the weekend, news outlets in the UK reported that Prince Andrew was mounting an effort to get his settlement with Jeffrey Epstein victim Virginia Giuffre overturned, but legal experts told Insider that such an effort will be nearly impossible.
Giuffre claims Epstein sex-trafficked her to Andrew when she was 17 years old. She sued the prince in 2021, alleging battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress. While Andrew has always maintained his innocence, the two settled out of court in February 2022, with Andrew reportedly paying millions of dollars.
Andrew has faced serious consequences for his relationship with Epstein. He stepped away from public life in 2019 after giving a disastrous BBC interview about Epstein, and was stripped of his military titles and royal patronages just weeks before his settlement with Giuffre was announced last year.
According to reports in The Mail on Sunday and The Sun, Andrew has consulted lawyers about whether he can overturn the settlement after Giuffre dropped another lawsuit against prominent attorney Alan Dershowitz. Giuffre long claimed that Epstein had sex-trafficked her to Dershowitz as well, but ended her lawsuit against Dershowitz in November, issuing a statement that she may have been mistaken in accusing Dershowitz of sexual abuse.
Representatives for the prince and Giuffre did not immediately respond to Insider’s requests for comment on Wednesday.
Sources told The Mail on Sunday and The Sun that Andrew always wanted to fight Giuffre’s allegations but felt like he was forced to settle so as not to distract from the celebrations around Queen Elizabeth II’s Platinum Jubilee last year.
“Andrew felt as if he was in a pressure-cooker, as if he was given no option but to settle,” a source told The Mail on Sunday. “But he never wanted to settle and has always insisted he was innocent. He wants to see what legal routes might be available to him.”
Andrew’s ‘buyer’s remorse’
While not unprecedented, legal experts in the US said that Andrew will have a tough time trying to force a retraction from Giuffre and get his money back.
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Source:: Business Insider