Witness Who Claims She Saw Prince Andrew Dancing With Giuffre at Club to Testify in Court - Report
04:03 GMT 28.09.2021 (Updated: 15:16 GMT 28.05.2023)
© AP Photo / Steve Parsons
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The 61-year-old prince has refuted the charges brought against him by Virginia Roberts Giuffre repeatedly and categorically. Despite the photographic evidence, Andrew initially denied any acquaintance with Giuffre, saying that he did not remember meeting her.
An eyewitness who claimed she saw Prince Andrew dancing with his alleged sex assault victim Virginia Giuffre in a nightclub in 2001 on the same night he said he was at Pizza Express has consented to testify in a pending civil suit in the United States.
According to The Mirror's report, UK businesswoman Shukri Walker is expected to say that she saw the Duke of York at London's Tramp nightclub and has even handed over written testimony to the FBI.
The woman reportedly distinctly recalled seeing Andrew with Giuffre, who was then 17 years old, after she apologized to him for treading on his foot while on the dance floor.
Walker, who reportedly was 28 at the time of the event, claimed that she decided to speak up after the disastrous BBC Newsnight interview by Andrew, in which he claimed that he could not have been at the nightclub with Giuffre since he recalls taking his daughter Princess Beatrice to a birthday party at a restaurant in Woking, Surrey.
"He [Andrew] looked like he was having a great time. And he was with this young girl who was close to my own age, perhaps even a bit younger than me," Walker is quoted in the report as saying. "The young woman wasn’t smiling, it was the opposite of smiles. They were with the woman who [had] just been arrested, Ghislaine Maxwell, and Epstein. I will never forget the night because I was told this is a real Prince."
Earlier, the prince reportedly also denied Giuffre's assertion that he was sweating heavily after dancing with her on the dancefloor, claiming that he could not sweat due to a medical ailment he developed after being shot while serving in the Falklands war. And Walker reportedly noted that she saw Andrew wiping the sweat off his face several times using the back of his hand.
Quoting an undisclosed source with knowledge of the situation, the outlet notes that Walker is "totally convinced she saw Andrew that night and is prepared to stand up in court to say so."
"With the civil case being launched in the United States she has let it be known that she is willing to testify and tell the truth," they added.
However, an anonymous "friend of the Duke's" reportedly told The Mirror that Shukri Walker "seems to be in a minority of one in her recollections."
"Tramp nightclub, which does not have either a back or side entrance, was a popular celebrity hang-out and had paparazzi staked outside of its doors every night of the week," the source is quoted as saying. "It is worth noting that not a single image of the Duke either arriving or leaving Tramps on the weekend in question has ever emerged."
Also on Monday, The Times reported, citing a source within Prince Andrew's circle, that by filing the civil complaint, Giuffre "has actively invited legal scrutiny of her own version of events."
"This provides an opportunity for the duke's team to properly scrutinise the multiple inconsistencies in her narrative that have emerged over the years, and you can expect to see a rigorous defence of all her allegations," the source said.
Giuffre, now 38, is suing Andrew in New York, claiming he sexually assaulted her a total of three times both in New York and on the late convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein's island in the Caribbean.
