EFTA Document EFTA01779183

From: 1 <-> Sent: Sunday, March 13, 2011 12:48 AM To: Jeffrey Epstein Dominic Lawson: I stayed at Epstein's so hound =ndrew Prince Andrew has been =amned for his choice of friends, but he is blessed in his enemies, like =abour MP Chris Bryant The Sunday Times Published: 13 March =011 • Recommend (0) ` Comment (0) Print Follow Comment Guilt by association is a conveniently elastic property =or the press, when it is engaged in a manhunt. In this case the man is =rince Andrew, Duke of York, and he has been associating with a sex =ffender named Jeffrey Epstein. In 2008 Epstein was sentenced to 18 months in jail, having =leaded guilty to the charge of soliciting an underage girl for =rostitution. Last December Prince Andrew was snapped by a paparazzo while =alking in Central Park with Epstein and the shot was duly published in =he News of the World. The Prince and Epstein were old friends, and the fourth in =ine to the throne had been staying at the billionaire's New York =ansion. This occasioned only mild scandal at the time; but a =ortnight ago The Mail on Sunday published the account by • of her employment as a 17-year-old masseuse by Epstein, in which =he repeated in bowdlerised form her previously pseudonymous court =eposition — as "Jane Doe 102" — that she had been "sexually =xploited by Epstein's adult male peers including royalty". The story was accompanied by a =hotograph of Prince Andrew with his arm around Ms MI, taken in =001. Although the newspaper went out of its way to emphasise that there =as no suggestion that the Queen's second son had engaged in any =mproper or illegal sexual conduct, headlines such as "Prince Andrew =nd 'naked pool parties' at his paedophile friend's house" had =he desired effect of portraying a royal duke wallowing in sleaze. As is usual in such circumstances, =ther papers, not wanting to be left behind in the cross-country pursuit =f hunt the royal fox, have laboured mightily to be the next to draw =food from the prey. Thus, The Daily Telegraph — perhaps to the =onsternation of older readers accustomed to more respectful treatment =f the House of Windsor — ran the following headline across the full =idth of last Thursday's front page: "The duke, his paedophile =uest, and the most unusual use of an RAF base"; it went on to assert: =93The Duke of York is facing renewed questions about his friendship EFTA_R1_00096233 EFTA01779183 =ith Jeffrey Epstein after it emerged that the convicted paedophile =anded his private jet at an RAF fighter base during a visit [to see the ruke) at Sandringham." Cor! However, a closer reading of the body of the story yields the =act that the visit occurred back in 2000, many years before Epstein's =rial and conviction; and a Ministry of Defence spokesman admitted that =ivil aircraft are "routinely granted permission" to land at RAF =ases. So, not exactly "Cor!"; in fact, barely "Well, I =ever". I do recall thinking the friendship between Epstein =nd Andrew rather surprisingYet the Telegraph's story was a model =f understatement compared with the Daily Mirror's grotesque effort on =he same day: "Prince Andrew was dealt a fresh blow last night after =I was revealed pervert friend Jeffrey Epstein met his girls as =hildren. Papers show the paedophile, jailed for luring a young girl =nto prostitution, mingled with Princesses Eugenie and Beatrice in the =ahamas in 1998. A palace insider said: 'It was a fleeting meeting =ith Epstein, but it is still a great worry.— That's it; that's =he whole story, in full. Read it and weep — with laughter at the =utrageous contrivance of it all. I suppose, before I am outed by the Mirror as a paedophile at =ne remove, I had better confess all. In January 1999 we enjoyed a brief =amily holiday at Epstein's now notorious Florida home. My wife had =nown Epstein since the mid- 1980s; when she told him in the winter of =998 that our younger child had been most unwell for a long period, he =aid that what she needed was some sunshine and insisted we stay at his =alm Beach home. The place was empty, apart from us and the housekeeper; but, =es, I did notice a photograph in it of Epstein and his then girlfriend =hislaine Maxwell with Prince Andrew. This, of course, was before Andrew =ook on the job of being Britain's "special trade representative" =97 and long before the world knew of Epstein's involvement with =eenage girls (not the same thing as "paedophilia", by the way, =ince none of the girls was pre-pubescent, but undeniably both sordid =nd exploitative). I do recall thinking the friendship between Epstein and =ndrew rather surprising, but only because of the vast gulf in interests =nd intellect. Epstein is not interested in golf. The Coney Island-born =on of a New York park attendant, he began his career as a teacher of =hysics and calculus, later putting his remarkable mathematical =bilities to more profitable use as a financial trader and =dviser. As a billionaire he retained a consuming fascination with =cience, being a member of the New York Academy of Sciences and a =isiting fellow at Harvard: his biggest charitable donations are in the =ields of particle physics and artificial intelligence. On the one occasion I had a =onversation with him, it was about the development of chess computers =nd how they could be made to simulate human methods of calculation; it =oon became embarrassingly clear that I could not grasp a fraction of =hat he understood. As I said, it was impossible to see what he had in =ommon, intellectually at least, with the Duke of York. On the other =and, the notionally republican Americans have a perennial obsession =ith the British royal family — the impending wedding of Prince =illiam and Catherine Middleton seems almost bigger news there than here =97 and I suspect Epstein, an avid collector of objects and people, =anted to add a part of the House of Windsor to his fabulously expensive =ortfolio of exotica. Unfortunately, Andrew, trade ambassador or not, seems =lithely unaware of when he is being bought: it was this newspaper that =evealed he had accepted an offer of ElSm for his former Sunninghill =ome — £3m over the already ludicrous asking price — from a Kazakh =il and gas billionaire purporting to be "a friend". This is a =lassic case of the "unsolicited gift", given in the hope of a later =eturn of a favour. His negotiation last year of a $24,500 (£15,000) =oan from Epstein to help pay down his ex-wife's wearyingly habitual =ebts is on a very different scale; but, to put it at its most cynical, =hy risk the scandal this would cause for such a trivial sum? 2 EFTA_R1_00096234 EFTA01779184 Doubtless, Andrew would argue that =pstein was a genuine friend, and one who had served the prison sentence =or his crime; certainly his loyalty, however naive or ill considered =or a representative of the crown, is morally preferable to =erguson's emetic effusion: "I personally, on behalf of myself, =eeply regret that Jeffrey Epstein became involved in any way with me. I =bhor paedophilia and any sexual abuse of children ... whenever I can, I =ill repay the money and will have nothing ever to do with Jeffrey =pstein ever again." Bear in mind that she knew of Epstein's record =hen she asked her former husband to negotiate the loan, and you realise =hat self-serving, hysterical drivel this is. Yet the week's prize for =ypocritical conduct in this most competitive field must surely be =warded to Chris Bryant, the former Foreign Office minister, who argued =hat Prince Andrew's indiscretions over Epstein and the sale of his =ome were so ill befitting a person in his position that he should be =iven "the honourable order of the boot". This from an MP who posed =n his underpants on a website, advertising his desire for a "good, =ong f" I", who was a serial "flipper" of his second, =93parliamentary" home to claim additional expenses and who in 2004 =ubmitted a demand so exorbitant that even the dozy and emollient House =f Commons fees office disallowed it. Prince Andrew has been damned for his choice of friends, but =e is blessed in his enemies. 3 EFTA_R1_00096235 EFTA01779185