A former girlfriend of Prince Andrew, Lady Victoria Hervey, on Wednesday claimed that the notorious picture of Prince Andrew with his arm around Virginia Giuffre’s waist was a fake made with an “Irish body double.”
Hervey, 44, who dated Andrew, 62, in 1999 appeared on a British documentary earlier this month about Ghislaine Maxwell in which she said she was used as “bait” by Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein.
Hervey, whose brother was the famously dissolute 7th Marquess of Bristol, appeared to back claims made by Andrew’s camp that the photograph is fake.
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Last week, a source familiar with Andrew’s thinking and legal strategy told The Daily Beast that he considered the photograph of Andrew and Giufffre “irrelevant” unless and until the original was produced. A source on Giuffre’s side admitted to The Daily Beast that they did not even know whether the original of the photograph still existed.
On Instagram Wednesday, Hervey posted what looks like a version of the widely circulated picture, sloppily edited to show Giuffre alone against a plain two-tone background.
Hervey wrote: “Do you believe that photo is real? Or what if I told you a survivor of Epstein’s told me it’s an Irish body double that was edited in.”
Hervey also posted a well-known picture of Giuffre on a yacht in the south of France that was taken at Naomi Campbell’s birthday in 2001, in which she appears to be wearing the same outfit—a strappy pink top and colorful trousers—that she wore in the picture with Andrew.
Hervey’s implication appeared to be that it was suspicious that Giuffre was wearing the same outfit at both occasions.
Andrew has refused to accept the photo is genuine in recent court documents.
This mirrors the position he took in his disastrous Newsnight interview when he said: “From the investigations that we’ve done, you can’t prove whether or not that photograph is faked or not because it is a photograph of a photograph of a photograph…Nobody can prove whether or not that photograph has been doctored but I don’t recollect that photograph ever being taken.”
Giuffre has repeatedly insisted that the photo is genuine. In an interview with British TV show Panorama she said: “It’s a real photo. I’ve given it to the FBI for their investigation and it’s an authentic photo. There’s a date on the back of it from when it was printed.”
