For decades, we’ve known that Sarah Ferguson (the Duchess of York) also had some kind of relationship with Jeffrey Epstein. While Epstein was trafficking girls to Fergie’s ex-husband Prince Andrew, Fergie was getting money from Epstein. The official story is that Epstein gave Fergie a one-time five-figure sum. Many believe that Epstein loaned Fergie a much larger sum and it was all covered up, because once people found out about the five-figure sum, they freaked out. Did I mention that Epstein gave/loaned Fergie this money after he went to prison the first time? After he was already a convicted p3do? When the British press found out about the money, Fergie had to issue a public statement apologizing for her bad decision. As it turns out, right after her public statement, she sent a private letter/email to Epstein where she apologized to him for the statement and told him she basically did it to save her post-royal career.
A bombshell email obtained by The Mail on Sunday has revealed how the Duchess of York cynically lied when she pledged to cut ties with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein. Just weeks after publicly disowning the vile billionaire, Sarah Ferguson wrote him a gushing private message calling him a ‘steadfast, generous and supreme friend’ – and admitting she only distanced herself from him to save her own reputation. She sent the grovelling message ‘from the truth of my heart’, less than two months after telling journalists: ‘I will never have anything to do with [Epstein] again.’
The extraordinary email will send shock waves through the Royal Family and will fuel calls for King Charles and Prince William to completely ostracise the disgraced Yorks. It comes just days after the Duke and Duchess launched an ill-judged return to the public limelight with a prominent, and widely criticised, appearance at the funeral of the Duchess of Kent.
Last night a spokesman for the Duchess said that Epstein had threatened to sue her for defamation after her Evening Standard interview and she had been advised to try and ‘assuage’ him. She stands by her public condemnation of the paedophile, the spokesman added.
The emails between the billionaire and the Duchess were exchanged after he was released from a Florida jail in July 2009, having served 13 months of an 18 month sentence for soliciting prostitution from girls as young as 14. Just under 18 months later, in December 2010, Epstein agreed to pay £15,000 owed in unpaid wages and other bills to Sarah’s former personal assistant, Johnny O’Sullivan. The deal, orchestrated by Prince Andrew, allowed a wider restructuring of the Duchess’s debts, which were approaching £5million. Details of Epstein’s generous assistance were uncovered by the media in March 2011, causing embarrassment to the Royal Family.
On March 7, 2011, in the interview with Mr Greig splashed on the front page of the Evening Standard, the duchess made a ‘heartfelt apology’ for accepting Epstein’s cash. In comments that made headlines around the world, she said: ‘I personally, on behalf of myself, deeply regret that Jeffrey Epstein became involved in any way with me. I abhor paedophilia and any sexual abuse of children and know that this was a gigantic error of judgment on my behalf. I am just so contrite I cannot say. Whenever I can, I will repay the money and have nothing ever to do with Jeffrey Epstein ever again.’ Castigating her former friend, she added: ‘What he did was wrong and for which he was rightly jailed.’ And, in apparent exasperation, she pledged to cut off all contact with him. ‘I will never have anything to do with him again. I deeply regret it. How many more times do you want me to underline that?’
But weeks later Sarah was privately disavowing her comments in the desperate email to Epstein revealed today. Writing to her benefactor on April 26, she said: ‘You have always been a steadfast, generous and supreme friend to me and my family. As you know, I did not, absolutely not, say the “P word” [paedophile] about you but understand it was reported that I did. However, I am apologising to you today for not replying to your email or reaching out to you when the tabloids were so horrendous.’
She angrily condemned the media, who she said ‘used me to hurt you beyond realms’, and complained that the controversy over her links to him ‘was the worst nightmare for me’. Despite emphatically telling the Evening Standard that she would never have anything to do with Epstein again, she apologised for not contacting him sooner, saying: ‘It is unlike me’. Justifying her lack of contact, she said: ‘I was advised, in no uncertain terms, to have nothing to do with you and to not speak or email you and if I did I would cause more problems to you, the Duke and myself. I was broken and lost. I shut down and ran away. So please understand, as I do about you, that I was broken and not the strong person you know and I got completely obliterated and I saw all my children’s work disappearing. I didn’t want to hurt Andrew one more time.’
She told Epstein ‘we are, and have both been, in the firing line’ adding that they had ‘both [been] blamed for stuff we have not done.’
And, in perhaps the most jaw-dropping passage, she suggested that she had been told to give the interview as part of a strategy to protect her writing career and charity work. ‘I was instructed to act with the utmost speed if I would have any chance of holding on to my career as a children’s book author and a children’s philanthropist.’
Last night, a spokesman for the Duchess said: ‘The Duchess spoke of her regret about her association with Epstein many years ago, and as they have always been, her first thoughts are with his victims. Like many people, she was taken in by his lies. As soon as she was aware of the extent of the allegations against him, she not only cut off contact but condemned him publicly, to the extent that he then threatened to sue her for defamation for associating him with paedophilia. She does not resile from anything she said then. This email was sent in the context of advice the Duchess was given to try to assuage Epstein and his threats.’
I mean, I actually understand her rationale, but arguing “don’t you get it, I was just trying to save myself and keep Epstein from suing me” is a hell of an argument. Somewhat interestingly, Fergie never paid Epstein back, to my knowledge. Not for the widely-reported smaller sum and not for the larger sum which everyone believes Epstein gave her or loaned her. She really took that monster’s money, publicly called him a p3do, then privately told him “don’t worry, I still consider you a friend, besties 4 eva.” Insane. There’s a lot of commentary about what this means and whether King Charles will completely cut his ties with the Yorks, blah blah blah. I’ll have some of that in another post.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid, Cover Images.
