Prince Andrew accepts he has been served with a sexual assault lawsuit in the United States, after denying he was properly served a month ago in Britain.
Key points:
Prince Andrew's lawyers said a previous attempt to serve the duke did not follow proper procedure
Prince Andrew is accused of forcing Virginia Giuffre to have sex with him at the homes of Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell
Epstein is now dead and Ghislaine Maxwell awaits trial for grooming underage girls
His accuser, Virginia Giuffre, says the Duke of York forced her to have sex with him at the London home of the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein two decades ago.
Prince Andrew and Ms Giuffre agreed that service of the lawsuit was effective as of September 21, according to a joint filing on Friday with the US District Court in Manhattan.
Ms Giuffre's lawyers said they had served Prince Andrew, Queen Elizabeth II's second son, in Britain but his lawyers claimed improper procedure, as English law and the Hague Convention were not followed.
Subject to court approval, Prince Andrew will have until October 29 to formally respond to the lawsuit.
He has not waived his defences against Ms Giuffre's allegations, which he had previously "categorically" denied.
The agreement appears for now to end a month-long effort by Prince Andrew's legal team, including lawyers in Britain, to block Ms Giuffre's lawsuit at the outset rather than have the 61-year-old prince defend against it.
Andrew Brettler, a Los Angeles-based lawyer for Prince Andrew, declined to comment.
Lawyers for Ms Giuffre did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The Jeffrey Epstein connection
Ms Giuffre, 38, accused the prince in her August 9 lawsuit of forcing her to have sex about two decades ago, when she was underage, at the London home of Epstein's long-time associate Ghislaine Maxwell.
She also said Prince Andrew abused her at around the same time at Epstein's mansion in Manhattan and on Epstein's private island in the US Virgin Islands.
Prince Andrew has not been charged with crimes.
Reuters: Lucas Jackson/File photo
)His lawyers are seeking to review a 2009 settlement agreement from a lawsuit against Epstein in Florida to determine whether it requires a dismissal of Ms Giuffre's case.
Ms Giuffre is seeking unspecified damages.
Epstein, a registered sex offender, also had a home in Florida.
He took his own life at age 66 in a Manhattan jail in August 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges.
Ms Giuffre sued Prince Andrew under a 2019 New York law that gave survivors of childhood sexual abuse a since-closed two-year window to sue their alleged abusers over conduct occurring many years or decades earlier.
Ms Maxwell faces a scheduled November 29 trial in Manhattan on charges she helped recruit and groom underage girls for Epstein to abuse.
She has pleaded not guilty.
Reuters
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2021-09-25 05:24:38Z
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