Andrew Mountbatten Windsor’s security detail were “left in the dark” about Jeffrey Epstein’s sordid past during his notorious New York trip, it is claimed.
Ex-royal protection officer Scott Hamer said the team guarding the disgraced former Prince “did not know” the billionaire financier was a convicted paedophile when they visited his luxury Manhattan mansion.
He said the Met Police team wouldn’t have been clued-up on Epstein’s 2008 Florida conviction. The 2010 trip to New York, which took place after Epstein had served time for soliciting an underage girl, resulted in an infamous photograph of the pair strolling through Central Park.
Speaking on The Crime Agents podcast and to LBC, former senior protection officer Hamer said: “I suspect that for most of his protection team at the time, Jeffrey Epstein would have just been one of the people that he was connected with. They probably wouldn’t have even known who he was at that time.”
He noted that because the court case took place in Florida, it might have been viewed as a “local” matter.
He said: “This is not taking anything away from it, but, you know, that was localised, it wouldn’t have been a national issue, I think, so the officers might not have been aware of that [given] it’s a local court decision.”
While eyewitnesses claimed young women were seen entering and leaving Epstein’s property during the visit, Hamer insisted that a bodyguard’s job is safety. He argued that while meeting a convicted sex offender is “immoral,” it is not illegal.
He said: “If the principal was conducting their business, the protection officer’s business is to wrap security around that.” Hamer added that protection officers are not meant to act as the “moral police.”
Andrew has consistently and vigorously denied all allegations of sexual misconduct or wrongdoing. He famously told BBC Newsnight in 2019 that the 2010 New York trip was intended to “break off” his association with the disgraced financier.
The claims follow reports that some security members may have “turned a blind eye” to activities on Epstein’s private Caribbean island, Little Saint James.
While Hamer, who did not visit the island, maintained he never saw anything illegal, he admitted that some officers might have become “over-familiar” with the royals they protected.
He said: “There were people…who I would say probably were over-familiar or had been around a long, long time and maybe thought that, you know, they were part of the furniture and they were part of the principal’s team rather than the Met.”
Scotland Yard confirmed they are reaching out to former and serving officers who worked with Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to see if any relevant information comes to light.
A spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police said: “They have been asked to consider carefully whether anything they saw or heard during that period of service may be relevant to our ongoing reviews and to share any information that could assist us.”
The force added that while they are aware of media reports, “no new criminal allegations” regarding sexual offences within their jurisdiction have been made.
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