The former Prince Andrew has been arrested by British police on charges of sharing confidential information with pedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein between 2010 and 2011 in his former role as a trade emissary for the London government.

The son of Elizabeth II and brother of the current sovereign of the United Kingdom Charles III, the British press reports, is accused of "misconduct in public office".

The searches

The operation began this morning, as emerges from photos released by the British media showing several unmarked police cars and plainclothes officers guarding the entrance to Wood Farm , the residence on the royal estate of Sandringham in Norfolk where the Windsor outcast recently moved after being evicted from the Royal Lodge residence by King Charles in the face of revelations about his brother's involvement in the Epstein scandal.

British police officers also searched the sumptuous cottage adjacent to the royal Windsor Castle. The arrest warrant allows investigators to search all properties and former properties linked to the suspect.

"Let justice take its course," was King Charles III's laconic comment. "One of the pillars of our system is that no one is above the law," British Prime Minister Keir Starmer told the BBC. These words can only increase the pressure on the former Duke of York, who has fallen definitively from grace in the royal family following revelations contained in files published in the US.

Birthday in prison

Andrew Mountbatten Windsor has not currently been charged or formally charged, but is under investigation for the suspected crime of "unlawful conduct in the exercise of an official function." Technically, pre-trial detention can last up to 96 hours, but only if approved by the judiciary in a series of court proceedings. Otherwise, as a general rule, the police complete the questioning process within 12 to 24 hours , after which they decide whether to proceed with the indictment before a judge (with possible release on bail or not), release him with the investigation continuing, or release him with all charges dropped.

Andrea is therefore destined to spend the next few hours—and today is his birthday—far from the comforts of his life and the luxuries to which he has always clung : albeit in a private security room, the BBC reports, equipped with a bathroom and a cot. The investigation concerning him adds to eight other lines of inquiry opened or reopened by British police into the potential repercussions of the Epstein scandal in the United Kingdom : lines that also involve suspicions of sex trafficking for the private flights of girls once exploited by the American fixer and "shared"—according to the Epstein files—with VIP friends living on the island, including Andrea.

(Unioneonline/D)

© Riproduzione riservata