The father of Virginia Roberts has called on Prince Andrew to be jailed because he ‘needs to know what it’s like to be held accountable’.
Sky Roberts, who lives on a ranch in Summerfield, Florida, said the Royal ‘thinks he can do whatever he wants’ and should face justice for allegedly sexually assaulting Ms Roberts when she was a teenager. Andrew vehemently denies the allegation.
A pre-trial hearing in her civil action is set to take place today in New York but Andrew’s lawyers are considering boycotting it, claiming the legal papers were not properly served.
Mr Roberts, 65, wore a cowboy hat and beige shirt with a horse design across the front as he spoke to Good Morning Britain from Florida today
‘I would like to see him go to prison for at least a little while. He needs to know what it’s like to be held accountable for his actions,’ he said.
‘He needs to be held accountable. This is not the times of William Wallace when royals can just do whatever they want.
‘The times have changed. Prince Andrew thinks it’s still those times where he can do whatever he wants.’
The father of Virginia Roberts has called on Prince Andrew to be jailed because he ‘needs to know what it’s like to be held accountable’
Virginia Roberts, then aged 17, is pictured with Prince Andrew and Ghislaine Maxwell in London in 2001. Prince Andrew was served at his home in Britain with paperwork for the bombshell sexual assault lawsuit
Virginia, now 38, claims the prince assaulted her three times when she was under the age of 18 and a victim of sex trafficking.
She alleges the assault’s took place in London at Ghislaine Maxwell’s house, in New York and on Jeffrey Epstein’s private island.
Mr Roberts said: ‘I’m very proud of my daughter to step up and put this civil suit against him.
Sky Roberts says the Royal ‘thinks he can do whatever he wants’ and should face justice for allegedly sexually assaulting Virginia
‘He knows what he’s done wrong and it’s like I’ve been reading this past week, even trying to serve him papers, he was instructing his guards to tell them not to accept his court papers.
‘An innocent man doesn’t do that, only a guilty man does that.’
While the prince’s team are said to have signaled their intent not to participate in the telephone conference today, Judge Lewis Kaplan has ordered that both parties in the case ‘are directed to confer regarding an agreed scheduling order’, according to the Telegraph.
Judge Kaplan is looking to lay out a timetable for management of the case and if Andrew’s lawyers refuse to dial in for the hearing, it may be seen as being in defiance of his order.
Andrew’s legal team run the risk of incurring the wrath of respected judge Lewis A Kaplan
It comes after legal papers were finally accepted by the security chief at Andrew’s Windsor home over the weekend after weeks of ‘avoiding’ officials, court documents dramatically revealed.
The clock is now ticking on the Duke of York, who has 21 days to respond or he will face a default judgment.
Mr Roberts called on Andrew to ‘stop lying’ about his alleged relationship with Virginia and face justice.
He said: ‘I’ve read a lot of things like Prince Andrew saying he’s never met Virginia but everyone around the globe has seen the picture of Prince Andrew with his arm around my daughter and Miss Maxwell right behind him
‘That’s not a photoshopped picture, that’s a real picture.
‘He’s got to stop lying about this and step up. If he’s telling his guards that he can’t even accept papers, an innocent man doesn’t do that.’
The father added that he hugely regrets having taken Virginia to meet Epstein when she started working for him as a massage therapist.
He said: ‘I met Jeffrey Epstein when she first was going to start working for him but it was supposed to be massage therapy.
‘I thought that might be a good job to learn. When I met him he was just in jeans in front of his mansion and seemed like a regular guy
‘I had no idea what was going on. As a father, if I knew anything that was going on, I would have stopped it.
‘It’s huge regret to me. I loved my daughter when she was born, I love her now and I’ve loved her all the times in between.’
Andrew’s lawyers claimed the papers were not properly served and hope to get the case thrown out on a technicality.
In a legal filing, his solicitor Gary Bloxsome said the document Miss Roberts signed in 2009 may make her action invalid. It is the first indication of how the prince and his lawyers intend to fight the case after weeks of silence.
On Friday, a new affidavit was also lodged in New York from a London-based ‘corporate investigator and process server’, Cesar Augusto Sepulveda, who was employed to personally serve Andrew with court papers relating to the US action.
Virginia Roberts (left) claims she was forced to have sex with Andrew when she was 17. Prince Andrew (right in April) has denied the allegations and has not been charged with any criminal offence
He records how he first went to Royal Lodge, Andrew’s Windsor mansion, on August 12 and was met by Metropolitan Police officers guarding the gate who told him they ‘could not raise anyone in charge’.
They said they had been ‘instructed not to allow anyone attending there for the purpose of serving court process on the grounds of the property’. And they added that no documentation would be forwarded on, leaving the server with the strong impression they had been ‘primed’.
But Mr Sepulveda returned on August 27 and was told he could now leave his papers and they would be forwarded.
In other court documents, Roberts’ lawyer David Boies detailed the extensive efforts they went to in order to serve Andrew.
They said that on August 12, four days after filing the lawsuit, he sent copies of the summons and the complaint to five different lawyers from three law firms who they had ‘reason to believe’ represented the Duke.
On the same day Boies’ team emailed the same documents doy.office@royal.uk, the Duke of York’s public email, and got a response acknowledging the email.
On August 18, a copy of the complaint and summons was sent to Blair Berk, the Los Angeles lawyer who reportedly represents Andrew. The next day Clare Montgomery of Matrix Chambers in London replied that she was ‘not authorized’ to accept service on behalf of the Duke.
On August 26, Boies said that his lawyers sent Andrew a copy of the summons and the complaint at Royal Lodge via a same-day courier service. They also sent a copy by regular post in the UK and via FedEx, which was sent on August 16 and was delivered on August 20.
According to Boies these measures ensure they have ‘properly served’ the summons according to the rules of the Hague Convention on the Service Abroad of Judicial Documents, to which the US and UK are parties.
The serving has now been ratified under civil procedure rules as required by the Supreme Court of England and Wales. There was no comment from the Duke of York’s legal team last night.
They are now trying to access the sealed document Miss Roberts signed via the US courts because they believe it may prevent the case from progressing. The initial hearing is at 9pm UK time on Monday in a conference call before a Manhattan judge.
Miss Roberts’ representatives have indicated they will fight the move by the prince’s team, saying there is ‘no evidence’ he was ever intended to be covered by the previous legal agreement.
The 38-year-old, who is arguably Epstein’s most high-profile victim, has repeatedly accused the Queen’s son of having sex with her three times when she was aged 17 in London, New York and the British Virgin Islands.
Last month she launched a surprise legal move lodging a civil claim against the prince for rape, sexual assault and battery. Andrew, 61, has refused to comment on the case but has previously strongly denied her claims.
Miss Roberts alleges she was scouted and groomed as a schoolgirl by Epstein and his then-girlfriend, Ghislaine Maxwell, before being used by the billionaire financier as an underage ‘sex slave’.
In 2009 she reached a confidential settlement in Florida with the financier that may contain clauses which prevent her from taking action against individuals she has accused of being co-conspirators of the tycoon.
One of those was high-profile US lawyer Alan Dershowitz, who previously represented Epstein. He was accused of sexual assault by Miss Roberts in 2019.
But last month she reportedly dropped the claim because of the Epstein settlement, which released him from liability.
Her withdrawal was described in a joint court filing last month as ‘a compromise’ that should not be viewed as an admission by either party of the validity or invalidity of the claims about the settlement agreement. Mr Dershowitz has lodged a request with the Manhattan court dealing with the action against Andrew to have the original agreement unsealed, as he believes it may help to get the case against the prince thrown out.
The Harvard law professor said yesterday: ‘We strongly suspect that Virginia and her lawyers may have committed fraud on the court by filing a lawsuit against Prince Andrew after dismissing the battery case against me.
‘The same reasons for dismissing the case against me seem to apply to Prince Andrew. These documents should get the charges against Prince Andrew thrown out. It’s an airtight defence for Prince Andrew and a potential fraud on the court.’
Prince Andrew with his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson leaving Windsor to drive to the Queen’s Balmoral estate in Scotland Wednesday
Prince Andrew walking with Jeffrey Epstein in Central Park, New York City in 2011 after the friends left Epstein’s home in Manhattan
But Miss Roberts’ lawyer, David Boies, has said there was ‘no evidence Prince Andrew was intended to be covered by the release’.
Mr Boies said he was unable to comment on the details of her settlement with Epstein, citing its confidentiality, but added: ‘What I can say is that there is no evidence that Prince Andrew was intended to be covered by the release.
‘And, indeed, Prince Andrew has never himself asserted that he was intended to be covered by the release.’
In a letter obtained by ABC News in the US, Mr Bloxsome described the methods used by Miss Roberts’ legal team as ‘objectionable’.
In correspondence with a judge, he said: ‘They have made several public, indeed well-publicised, attempts at irregular service of these proceedings in this jurisdiction, in at least one case accompanied by a media representative.’
Mr Bloxsome maintained that under British law, a valid request for assistance from UK court officials must come from a judicial or diplomatic officer in the US.
US district judge Kaplan must now decide whether Andrew has been officially served. If he does, the prince will be given a deadline to respond.
The Rottweiler vs the Pitbull: The rival legal teams in the Prince Andrew case
Prince Andrew has assembled a ‘dream team’ of high-powered American lawyers and feels ‘confident’ that the civil case against him for rape and sexual assault will be thrown out of court.
The Duke’s legal team in the United States is believed to include Blair Berk, a high-powered, Los Angeles-based lawyer whose previous clients include Harvey Weinstein, Britney Spears, Leonardo DiCaprio and Mel Gibson.
‘Blair is one of the best in the business. She’s nicknamed The Rottweiler,’ said a lawyer who has worked with her.
The Duke’s legal team in the United States is believed to include Blair Berk (right, pictured with Cee Lo Green), a high-powered, Los Angeles-based lawyer
‘She takes no prisoners. If anyone can clear Andrew’s name and sort out this mess, she can.’
Virginia Roberts’ legal team is headed by David Boies who is working on the case pro bono.
The 80-year-old, known as the Pitbull, is one of the most celebrated litigators in the US and normally charges nearly $2,000 an hour.
He previously represented Al Gore when he challenged the result of the 2000 election at the supreme court against George W. Bush.
But he became embroiled in a scandal in 2015 after defending long-term client Harvey Weinstein, who would later hire Boies’ opponent in the Prince Andrew case, Blair Berk.
Boies and his firm were representing the New York Times and he allegedly tried to ‘kill’ negative stories about his client Weinstein.
He also hired Israeli private intelligence firm Black Cube to dig into the lives of Weinstein’s accusers, it has been claimed.
Virginia Roberts’ legal team is headed by David Boies who is working on the case pro bono
When Ronan Farrow wrote an expose on the lawyer, the New York Times fired his firm and shortly after, Boies and Weinstein parted ways.
Gillers said: ‘Like many great litigators, he is a “take no prisoners” kind of guy. He’ll deploy whatever strategy will be most effective.’
Boies represented medical company Theranos, whose founder Elizabeth Holmes is currently on trial accused of fraud and conspiracy.
Stephen Gillers, a professor at New York University’s school of law, told The Times: ‘Absolutely Boies cares about the reputational hit of the past few years.
‘Not because it will hurt his income, because it won’t, but because he wants to preserve that reputation for posterity, long after he is gone.’
Boies has been married four times and has five children and owns a vineyard and a racing yacht.