Lawyers for Virginia Roberts Giuffre now say they have successfully served Prince Andrew with notice of her sexual abuse lawsuit filed in New York.
The BBC reported that court documents say a process server left the legal papers with a police officer at the Royal Lodge on August 27.
According to Forbes, the paperwork from process server Cesar Augusto Sepulveda was filed in court in New York on Friday.
Meanwhile, the Daily Mail reported that Andrew’s attorneys say the papers were not served properly and they have no plans to attend a hearing scheduled on the case on Monday.
The report came after earlier reporting saying that the British royal had been avoiding service, as CrimeOnline previously reported.
“Process servers have shown up at his residence, and they have refused to take the summons and refused to let the process servers in to serve,” David Boies, chairman of New York City-based law firm Boies Schiller Flexner LLP, which represents Giuffre, told ABC News. “He has stopped coming out in public. He has been moving around.”
Giuffre filed the lawsuit early last month, accusing Andrew of sexually abusing her when she was 17. She has previously said that billionaire pedophile Jeffrey Epstein paid her to have sex with the Duke of York when she was under age.
Prince Andrew denies the accusations.
According to the BBC, a process server went to the Royal Lodge on August 26 and was unable to serve the papers. The court documents say he was told that the prince’s security team “had been told not to accept service of any court process.”
Sepulveda was given contact information for a solicitor but got no response.
The following day, he returned to Royal Lodge and spoke with “the head of security,” who reportedly told him he could leave the papers with police at the main gates and they would be sent on to the lawyers. Giuffre’s legal team, the BBC said, considers the papers served, but a US District Court judge will make that final determination.
Prince Andrew has until September 17 to respond to the lawsuit, if the judge determines he has been served.
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[Featured image: Prince Andrew/Steve Parsons/Pool Photo via AP, file and Virginia Roberts Giuffree/AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews, file]
