TOPLINE British royal Prince Andrew on Monday was served with legal papers in the United States relating to a sexual assault lawsuit filed against him by a woman who has accused him of sexually abusing her when she was a minor, which he denies, in a move that deals a major blow to the royal’s attempt to stall the case and leaves him with the prospect of facing a damaging court case.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-facts">KEY FACTS</h2>



Lawyers for Virginia Giuffre, the accuser, said they sent the civil lawsuit to the prince’s Los Angeles-based lawyer Andrew Brettler by email and FedEx, and both copies were received on Monday, Reuters&nbsp;<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/prince-andrew-is-served-accusers-sexual-assault-lawsuit-united-states-lawyers-2021-09-21/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>.



Earlier on Monday, the lawsuit papers arrived at the Royal Courts of Justice in London, Sky News&nbsp;<a href="https://news.sky.com/story/prince-andrew-legal-papers-sent-to-la-lawyer-notifying-him-of-civil-sexual-assault-case-12413215" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">reported</a>.



Under U.S. federal rules, Andrew’s team has 21 days to respond to the lawsuit or possibly face a default judgment.



The 61-year-old royal had been accused by a judge in the U.S. of actively evading all efforts to serve him papers with Giuffre’s lawyers, likening the situation to a “game of hide and seek behind palace walls.”



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-key-background">KEY BACKGROUND</h2>



Since 2015, Giuffre has alleged that she was forced by financier Jeffrey Epstein and his associate Ghislaine Maxwell to have sex with the prince when she was still a minor. Giuffre said she was sexually abused by the royal at Maxwell’s London home, Epstein&#8217;s mansion in Manhattan and on Epstein&#8217;s private island in the U.S. Virgin Islands. She is seeking unspecified compensatory and punitive damages from the British royal over “severe and lasting” effects caused by Andrew’s alleged actions. Andrew and his legal team have vehemently denied Giuffre’s accusations and have argued that Giuffre’s claims may be invalid under terms of a 2009 settlement reached by Epstein in Florida. In August 2019, Epstein died by suicide in jail while awaiting sex trafficking charges. Maxwell has remained in custody since her 2020 arrest on sex trafficking charges.



<h2 class="wp-block-heading" id="h-further-reading">FURTHER READING</h2>



<a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/prince-andrew-is-served-accusers-sexual-assault-lawsuit-united-states-lawyers-2021-09-21/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Prince Andrew is served accuser&#8217;s sexual assault lawsuit in United States</a>&nbsp;(Reuters)



<a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2021/09/20/prince-andrew-urged-ditch-legal-team-fears-strategy-grow/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Prince Andrew formally served sex assault lawsuit in US</a>&nbsp;(The Telegraph)

The Duke Of York, The UK’s Special Representative For International Trade and Investment Visits Crossrail

Prince Andrew Formally Served Virginia Giuffre’s Sexual Assault Lawsuit In U.S.

Sexual offences and violence against women remain pervasive in the West African country, which in the past has had the distinction of being led by Africa’s first elected female head of state.



I have been working on women’s rights for at least seven years. It has never been easy, but at no time have we been busier than in 2020. We are fighting several other epidemics in the shadow of the Covid-19 pandemic: domestic violence, rape, and other sexual offenses and murders. We are confronting these while at the same time fighting to compel our government to act. 



<div class="wp-block-image is-style-default"><figure class="alignright size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Abigail-Liberia-headshot1-768x1024.jpeg" alt="" class="wp-image-49395" width="285" height="380" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Abigail-Liberia-headshot1-768x1024.jpeg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Abigail-Liberia-headshot1-225x300.jpeg 225w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Abigail-Liberia-headshot1-300x400.jpeg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Abigail-Liberia-headshot1-600x800.jpeg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/Abigail-Liberia-headshot1.jpeg 960w" sizes="(max-width: 285px) 100vw, 285px" /></figure></div>



My work has focused mostly in Ganta, a sprawling urban town in northern Liberia, where I grew up. Ganta has not totally left its rural trappings even though it is developing fast. Its population is a mixture of modernizers seeking to upend tradition, particularly practices that undermine human rights, and conservatives determined to preserve old traditions.&nbsp;



I represent the former, and as you might expect, I often come into conflict with the values of the ‘older generation’ who believe that as a young person, I should not speak against sexual and gender-based violence, female genital circumcision, child marriage and rape. I have never faced direct threats to my life for speaking against these practices, but I have been ‘warned’, shamed, harassed, and sometimes pressured into temporary silence.



Where I come from, it is almost a taboo for a girl or woman to report sexual abuse. Those who do so only seek justice, but in most cases end up as a double victim. In addition to the abuse, they are stigmatized and blamed. To avoid stigmatization, many victims live with their pain and grieve silently while their abuser lives freely and continues to abuse others.&nbsp;



My organization has been determined to bring abusers to justice and end stigmatization and victim-blaming. To break this culture of silence and give young victims a safe space to speak out, we established human rights clubs in schools and communities. The clubs create awareness about rape and violence against women, and encourage and support victims to seek justice. The results so far have been mixed.&nbsp;



Some victims do initially speak out, but a good number will prefer to resolve the issue in their community rather than going to court. Unfortunately, they are often blamed and shamed when the community gets involved. The prohibitive cost of seeking justice in Liberia discourages victims, and frustrates us all.&nbsp;&nbsp;



So we now focus more on awareness and advocacy, believing that knowledge of the rape law among community members might deter offenders. However,&nbsp;as Covid-19 spreads across&nbsp;Liberia, the government introduced a semi-lockdown and closed schools. While they focused on curtailing the virus, sexual offences surged. The Ministry of Gender reported in July that about 600 cases of rape and sexual offences were reported between January and June 2020 – unreported cases could be five times higher.



We reacted to this news by mobilizing&nbsp;women’s groups across the country and organizing demonstrations to call on the government to take immediate action. I led the campaign in Nimba County, northeastern Liberia. In August, we staged three days of nationwide protests at various government institutions and public places. Our colleagues in Monrovia, Liberia’s capital, staged a protest outside the president’s office.



Our nationwide campaign was successful. The government immediately organized a multi-stakeholder conference on sexual offences, the president declared rape a national emergency and funding was increased to fight violence against women.



But that has not been the end. We still have more to do. Sexual offences and violence against women remain pervasive as many communities do not view these as crimes.&nbsp;Our job is to make them see these as punishable offences under the law. The government, too, needs to be reminded to deliver on its promises.&nbsp;



Our struggle will continue.



– By Abigail Freeman, founder of the Alliance for Gender Justice and Human Rights, an organization that champions women’s rights, promotes gender equality and elevates the voices of women and youth in rural Liberia.&nbsp;

Tag: Sexual Offences

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Prince Andrew Formally Served Virginia Giuffre’s Sexual Assault Lawsuit In U.S.

Breaking The Culture Of Silence In Liberia