JEFFREY Epstein wanted to blackmail Prince Andrew to help him evade justice and even “take down the Queen”, it was reported.
The claim has been made by a former businesses associate of multi-millionaire paedophile Epstein and friend of the Duke of York.
Andrew’s friendship with Epstein has come under intense scrutiny and one of the multi-millionaire’s sex slaves is currently suing the Royal.
He has strenuously denied any wrongdoing and strongly refuted the allegations made in the lawsuit.
Nor is there any suggestion that Epstein had any compromising material with which to blackmail Andrew.
Former business associate Steven Hoffenberg has now told Vanity Fair Epstein planned to use Prince Andrew as a means of his fulfilling his own grandiose plans.
The pair met in the 1990s and remained friends after Epstein served a prison sentence following a 2005 conviction for soliciting a minor for prostitution.
“In order to get ahead of all of his monstrous misconduct, Epstein had to have a national-security plan that would embarrass countries and their national security,” he said.
“He felt this would shield him from prosecution. He bragged about this.
“And Prince Andrew was a vital part of England and other countries and could open many doors for Epstein.
“He was probably his number one trophy. With Andrew, Epstein had a precise plan.”
Hoffenberg was the criminal mastermind between the pair fleecing hundreds of millions out of investors in one of the world’s biggest Ponzi schemes.
An unnamed friend of the Prince goes further, suggesting blackmailing Andrew could have allowed Epstein to at an even bigger target.
That entailed “taking down who I believe was Epstein’s real mark, Her Majesty the Queen of England”, the source says.
“Epstein could say, ‘What can I do with this little mouse in the cage before I eat him? Can he provide access?’,” said the friend.
“He’s going to tie a little noose around the mouse’s neck and he’s going to take him for a walk and lay cheese along his path—which are the underaged girls.
“And if Prince Andrew takes the cheese, and none of us believe he did, then Epstein would believe he has the family in the palm of his hand.”
The Vanity Fair article also quotes the friend as saying Epstein in 2010 in order to seek help for his wife Sarah Ferguson to pay off a $125,000 debt.
BIGGER TARGET
The friend said sex offender gave the royal the money as a “gift”.
It comes as Virginia Roberts Giuffre, now 38, is suing Andrew alleging he sexually assaulted her in New York, London and the island when she was 17.
The pair were photographed with his arm around her in Ghislaine Maxwell’s house in London.
In what was described as a car crash interview with the BBC in 2019, the Prince’s claimed he never met her and the photo was doctored.
Andrew famously claimed in the interview he was medically unable to perspire, a response to Virginia’s account of an alleged sweaty dance in London.
The criticism over what was seen as a failure to fully explain his relationship with Epstein saw him banished from royal duties.
Epstein hanged himself in prison in New York in 2019 while awaiting trial on sex trafficking offences.
Buckingham Palace refused to comment.
