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Re: VIDEO/Photos-Prince Andrew's EX Defends Him on SexSlave Allegations+FBI Have Tape
Koo Stark Reveals the Truth About Prince Andrew: After 32 years' Silence, Prince's Ex-Lover Gives Account of Affair to Defend Him from 'Sex Slave' Claims
- Prince Andrew accused of sleeping with an underage Virginia Roberts
- But former girlfriend Koo Stark believes these allegations are untrue
- Says her time with him has convinced her beyond doubt he is not guilty
- Recalls him as 'a nice man, a tender, loving and caring normal boyfriend'
Daily Mail UK, 15 Feb 2015
From taking her ****atoo to Buckingham Palace, to playing boardgames with the royals at Balmoral, Koo Stark (centre and left) reveals her life with Prince Andrew, and why it has convinced her he would never have slept with Virginia Roberts. In this world exclusive account she recalls a 'tender, loving and caring' man (right) who was always swooned over by women and had no need for 'forced sex'. She also recalls the emotional moment she learned he was to go war, and how she was kept from greeting him when he returned home with a rose clamped between his teeth.
Prince Andrew's former lover Koo Stark has broken her 32-year silence over their relationship to launch an explosive intervention into allegations he slept with a teenage ‘sex slave’.
Miss Stark, whose daughter is the Duke of York’s godchild, writes about their relationship for the first time in today’s Mail on Sunday.
She uses her personal and compelling account of their time together to make a point-by-point rebuttal of the devastating claims.
Her extraordinary revelations are intended to drive a wrecking ball into a lawsuit in which masseuse Virginia Roberts says she was forced to offer sexual favours to the Duke. Prince Andrew has denied having sex with Roberts.
None of Prince Andrew’s family or friends has been allowed to mount a detailed defence of him.
However Miss Stark, a 58-year-old artist and photographer, is so enraged by Ms Roberts’ claims, she has broken ranks – as well as her self-imposed silence – to protect her former boyfriend.
In her extraordinary account, she reveals: - How, from her first date with Andrew in 1981 to the media frenzy over a mildly erotic film role that would tear them apart, the character and behaviour of the man she loved and has remained friends with bears no resemblance to the figure described by Ms Roberts.
- That he was ‘tender, loving and caring’ and ‘very attractive to women’ and asks: ‘What need would he have for any women to be supplied for “forced sex”?’
- How Ms Roberts has invoked Andrew’s name simply to bring in ‘heavy artillery’ in her fight against paedophile US billionaire Jeffrey Epstein and the American state.
- When Andrew first asked her to ‘BP’ for lunch, she thought he was inviting her to a petrol station, rather than Buckingham Palace… and how she headbutted Prince Charles when she mistakenly curtseyed before kissing him.
- How she tried ‘everything’ to stop Andrew going to fight in the Falklands War.
- Remarkable insights into life with the Royal Family – including the moment her pet parrot caused mayhem at Buckingham Palace when it trapped its claws in the wallpaper.
Primarily, Miss Stark uses her account to rally to Andrew’s defence. She said:
‘I know too much about the media and the law courts to allow the disgrace of an innocent man.
‘That is why I have decided to reveal some details of my relationship with Andrew. My view is clear: I believe him to be a good man and I believe I can help rebut, with authority, the allegations against him.
‘Prince Andrew is a dear friend and godfather to my daughter. I’ve only known him to be honourable and honest, with Christian values.
'I couldn’t shrug off Virginia Roberts’ assassination of his character any more than he has been able to. He was being accused of the very worst kind of behaviour.
'The stain on his reputation is spilling across his life like blood from a new wound.’
Describing the Duke as ‘playful and tactile’ and ‘a normal boyfriend’, Miss Stark said: ‘This is not the person portrayed by Virginia Roberts.
‘I believe she and her lawyers are waging a war through the American courts and invoking his name by way of heavy artillery. American-style litigation takes no prisoners.’
Still friends: Andrew and his ex, Koo Stark, at a 1999 event. She says Virginia Roberts' allegations bare no relation to the man she knows
Prince Andrew has been named in a complex lawsuit brought by Ms Roberts. She is suing the state for failing to protect her rights when it entered a plea deal with Epstein, a former friend of the Duke.
Epstein was sentenced to 18 months jail on one count of sexual misconduct in 2008.
Ms Roberts alleges she met Epstein in 1999 at the age of 15 and he forced her to make herself available for sex with his powerful and well-connected friends until she turned 19.
She claims she had three encounters aged 17 and 18 with Prince Andrew – one in New York, one in London and one on Epstein’s private island in the Caribbean.
But Miss Stark is certain that the Duke would not take advantage of a ‘sex slave’ – and the Royal Family is known to be deeply distressed by the claims.
A photo taken by Andrew of the Queen with the Earl and Countess of Wessex and released on Facebook last week is being interpreted as an act of faith by Her Majesty.
The Queen has also promoted the Duke to the naval rank of Vice Admiral to mark his 55th birthday this Thursday.
However Palace protocol dictates that none of the Royal Family can speak out publicly, making Miss Stark’s intervention even more compelling.
Last night Buckingham Palace said:
‘We would not comment beyond what we have already stated in respect of Virginia Roberts.’
Koo Stark made a rare appearance in 2013;
Quote:
WORLD EXCLUSIVE: The true story of Andrew, me... and a stain on his reputation that's spilling like blood from a new wound
By KOO STARK
Good friends: The pair at a charity event in 1999. Koo says the prince is a 'good man' who has been deprived of the ability to defend himself
On a cold dark day in London last month, I was thinking about coffee and pondering my New Year’s resolutions when the phone rang. ‘Do you think he did it? asked the voice at the other end.
Instinct told me it was about Prince Andrew. ‘Who did what?’ I stalled.
The voice replied: ‘Do you think Prince Andrew slept with a teenage sex slave?’ I stopped breathing, muttered something unintelligible, hung up and Googled for news.
My first reaction was fury, then disbelief, at the lurid allegations being made against a man I have known well for more than 30 years.
Prince Andrew is a dear friend of mine and godfather to my daughter. I’ve only known him to be honourable and honest, with Christian values. I dismissed this latest story as just another sexual slur to add to the list of criticisms of him in recent years.
But I couldn’t shrug off Virginia Roberts’ assassination of his character any more than he has been able to. He was being accused of the very worst kind of behaviour.
The stain on his reputation is spilling across his life like blood from a new wound.
I know too much about the media and the law courts to allow the disgrace of an innocent man. That is why I have decided to now reveal some of the details of my relationship with Andrew.
Most people in this country have formed their own impression of him – either good or ill. My view is clear: I believe him to be a good man.
I firmly believe I can help rebut, with authority, the allegations against him. I will use those details to challenge Virginia Roberts’ description of a man which does not tally with the person I have known for more than half my lifetime.
I will also use them to question the legitimacy of Andrew’s name being spuriously dragged into a case in which he cannot defend himself.
And finally, I will use them to demonstrate how the global media is hiding behind the skirts of Ms Roberts’ testimony to besmirch an innocent man – just as it besmirched me when it claimed I’d crossed the line from appearing in mainstream films containing erotic scenes, to films made for the sex industry. (Falsely accused of appearing in porn, I have sued for libel and won.)
This new attack on Prince Andrew brought back poignant memories of the Caribbean island of Mustique, more than three decades ago.
It was then, as I holidayed with him in the autumn of 1982, that news of our romance first broke. The press we received rivalled that of Wallis Simpson and Edward VIII.
(Now, with Ms Roberts in the news I find myself wondering, is it only American women who are the nemesis of British Royal men?)
I also understand what it is to be accused of a crime.
An allegation of theft was made by my ex-fiance, American banker Warren Walker, who is the father of my daughter.
The judge entered a verdict of Not Guilty but in the media coverage of the case a lot of damage was done to my reputation.
It’s an experience that resonates with Prince Andrew’s current circumstances. The tragedy for him is that he cannot clear his name himself.
In a separate civil case in which I was involved with Walker, a judge held that ‘the father had consistently and over an extensive period given deliberately false evidence’.
Today: Koo says Virginia Roberts has 'besmirched an innocent man', spreading a stain across his life 'like blood from a new wound'
No referral was made by the courts for consideration to be given to a prosecution for perjury. I understand, therefore, that it is possible to face someone prepared to tell lies against you in court. It is wrong that this can happen and for that to go unpunished.
To be clear: Andrew has denied the accusations Ms Roberts has levied against him.
An official Buckingham Palace spokesman last month said:
‘It is emphatically denied that the Duke of York had any form of sexual contact or relationship with Virginia Roberts.
'The allegations made are false and without any foundation.’
Andrew later issued a personal denial at Davos, Switzerland. He said:
‘For the record, I refer to events that have taken place in the last few weeks.
'I just wish to reiterate and to reaffirm the statements which have already been made on my behalf by Buckingham Palace.’
I know him to be honest and I believe him. But it doesn’t matter what I think. The question is, when you have heard what I have to say, what will YOU believe?
The story of our first meeting is an instructive example of how our story was twisted from the start.
It was widely – and wrongly – reported to have been in Tramp, the very same nightclub where Ms Roberts says she first partied with him. It’s undisputed in books and newspaper articles.
Except what has been reported as fact is wrong. We didn’t meet there at all.
We were introduced by mutual friends on the night of his 21st birthday party in February 1981.
I was at the National Theatre understudying in the Tennessee Williams play Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf.
Friends, including the landlady of my basement flat in Chester Square, Belgravia, were taking Prince Andrew for a meal but the ‘spare girl’ had gone missing. It turned out I was her understudy too.
I was tired and more than a little grumpy after the curtain came down and I hadn’t committed to what was effectively a blind date.
I wasn’t even dressed to go out by the time a Royal Protection Officer knocked on my door and swept his torchlight past me, checking the flat.
I decided I ought to go and picked out a red suede Maxfield Parrish trouser suit with a nipped-in waist (this was the Eighties!) and a blue Chloe fur-lined raincoat for the winter night.
In the street, a car door opened. I climbed in and settled myself into the passenger seat, wrapping my coat around me.
Prince Andrew proffered his hand and said,
“Hello, I’m Andrew.” I don’t know what I’d expected. But it wasn’t for a prince to be doing his own driving.
We went to a restaurant called Bewicks on Walton Street, not far from Harrods, and ended up in the doorway together, jostling shoulder to shoulder.
As I stepped forward, Prince Andrew did the same and we crashed into each other before both swiftly stepping back. The same thing happened a second later. ‘I am a Prince, I go first,’ he said.
Being American, I retorted: ‘I am the Prince’s date, I go first,’ but he got his foot into the door just ahead of me, chuckling. We immediately had an easy familiarity.
As you can see from this exchange, he likes strong-minded women with a sense of humour.
It’s something I have in common with his ex-wife Sarah, the Duchess of York, who is, like me, older than Andrew.
I’m not saying he would never be interested in a meek teenage blonde, I am just pointing out that he is attracted to the very opposite.
In Ms Roberts’ diaries, which were apparently written eight years after the event (she must have a remarkable memory), her entry from the night she claims to have accompanied Prince Andrew to Tramp describes a boor whose behaviour and habits bear no resemblance to the gentleman I know.
Ms Roberts alleges she and Andrew were ‘let into the VIP section, where Andrew did not hesitate to grab us both an alcoholic ****tail and found a table in the corner of the extremely packed club. We took a few sips then headed to the dance floor.
'He was the most incredibly hideous dancer I had ever seen, and not to mention how embarrassing it was to have to be the one he smashed pelvises with, even if he was a Prince.’
She continued: ‘We only stayed at the club for little over an hour before his Highness was dripping from sweat and ready to embark on a quieter setting where we could get to know each other better, and from the way he was fondling me on the dance floor, I knew this was a man’s polite way of saying he wanted to intimately get acquainted.’
I’m sorry, but this is ridiculous. Don’t you think people would notice a member of the Royal Family at Tramp, behaving the way she depicts Prince Andrew on the night in question? Where are the pictures, the gossip column entries, the witnesses?
Indeed, my experience of being with Andrew on our first date in Bewicks informed me of the effect he has on any gathering, be it a restaurant, a club or a Royal court.
Conversation drops. Body language changes. There is a bow wave of deference. But Ms Roberts will have us believe this extraordinary hour in Prince Andrew’s life passed unchronicled.
It was in Bewicks that I first learned something that is today widely known and accurate: Prince Andrew does not drink alcohol. Not at all. This flatly contradicts Ms Roberts’ account.
Let’s consider her derogatory description of his behaviour towards her. In my experience, being in Prince Andrew’s company was never as Ms Roberts claimed.
Then, as now, he was very attractive to women. What need would he have for any women to be supplied for ‘forced sex’?
'Come to BP for lunch,' said Andrew. I thought, why IS he inviting me out to a petrol station?
Bearskin: Images from Koo's private collection reveal the playful relationship the two of them shared until it was torn apart
Consider the following. The man I met that first night had impeccable manners. He collected me from my home, drove us to the restaurant, managed to have plenty of fun without consuming any alcohol, drove me back and secreted a note which I found the next morning on my rustic Biedermeier dresser. ‘Come to BP tomorrow for lunch,’ it said.
Initially I wondered why he was taking me to a petrol station – it took me a moment to realise he meant Buckingham Palace. I went.
We had lunch on trays in the nursery which was the suite of rooms where he and Prince Edward had grown up, but was by then his flat in the Palace.
The meal was brought into the rooms which overlooked Green Park and Constitution Hill by an immaculately presented footman in tails yet Andrew himself was easy and informal.
He was playful, tactile and friendly. And that’s how it started, immediately.
I was single, he was single, we had every reason to be carefree and no reason not to be. When Andrew comes into your life there is no room for anyone else. He takes up all the space.
He walked into my life and that was it: he was my life. There was no discussion. None was needed. Suddenly I was his girlfriend.
The weeks and months that followed created some of the happiest memories I have of my life.
I could come and go to visit my boyfriend in Buckingham Palace without causing an international scandal – I even used to take my pet parrot with me. Candy was a roseate ****atoo.
On one such day, a page came in carrying a huge silver tray with tea on it. Candy took fright and flew up to the ceiling, where she got her claws stuck in the 1970s hessian wallpaper.
She couldn’t get down, so Andrew took charge, found a ladder used by Royal staff to clean the chandeliers and rescued her.
On another occasion, I went to the Palace, only to find he had moved rooms and I found myself on the wrong floor walking up and down calling out ‘Aaaandreeeeeew.’
Luckily, I was not mistaken for Palace intruder Michael ***an and arrested, but eventually found by a page and directed to his new rooms.
Mismatch: Koo admits the pair made an odd couple - he didn't drink in an age when not drinking meant being antisocial, and she took part in yoga when spiritualism had yet to become fashionable
It was a blurring of two very different worlds. I bought Andrew his first pair of denim jeans and he gave me a T-shirt of his which I loved. It said ‘Don’t Panic’. He bought me one of my own emblazoned with ‘Here comes Trouble’. I didn’t know whether to be pleased or insulted. Either way, looking back, he was right.
The point I’m trying to make is that Andrew is a nice man, a tender, loving and caring normal boyfriend.
Did I say normal? We did make an odd couple, especially in the 1980s when it was considered antisocial to abstain from alcohol and unusual, if not suspect, to practise yoga, as I have always done. Andrew adopted the practices he found useful for his health and I never minded being considered eccentric for standing on my head!
One of the things which united us and gave me insight into the real man was our shared interest in photography. Andrew is also skilled behind the camera but unlike me is technically gifted.
He could get anything broken to work again, took cameras apart and put them back together just for fun, he was a much better student than me.
We were both taught darkroom techniques by master printer and photographer Gene Nocon at his darkroom under the Royal Opera House and Andrew did all his own black and white printing.
This is not the person portrayed by Virginia Roberts. I believe she and her lawyers are waging a war through the American courts and invoking his name by way of heavy artillery. American style litigation takes no prisoners. It’s the antithesis to mediation or moderation.
The eminent Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz is also accused of receiving sexual favours from her.
Here is an edited extract of a defence he wrote for an English audience last month: ‘I have filed a sworn statement, subjecting me to perjury charges if untrue, categorically denying all the allegations and providing specific disproof of them. Prince Andrew may, of course, be in a different situation because he is a member of the Royal Family.
‘He is not as free as I am to pursue legal charges and make the same kind of public defence as I am able to. But if I am successful in disproving the charges against me, as I’m confident I will be, this will work to the Prince’s benefit, since it will establish that his accuser lacks credibility.’
Unwelcome attention: As the couple tried to relax in Mustique in 1982, they couldn't escape the press
He leaves no room for doubt about his own position or what he believes Prince Andrew’s to be. He also highlights how hard it is for Andrew to fight back.
Ms Roberts seems to be operating on the old myth that the Royals never explain and never complain but in this I believe she has erred. It is extraordinary. But it is not unprecedented.
In 1849, Prince Albert, on behalf of his wife Queen Victoria, brought a copyright action against a publisher who had acquired etchings of their children and dogs.
Then, in 1983, one of the scant times in hundreds of years of British history a reigning monarch has instigated legal action, the Queen sued for breach of confidence over revelations by a former member of Royal staff which led to the headline ‘Queen Koo romps at the Palace’.
It is true the usual policy has been a do-nothing and say-nothing strategy imposed by the men in grey suits at the Palace.
It’s still too often the default setting and today is even more outmoded and ineffectual than it was in 1982. While Prince Andrew diplomatically mounts his defence, the damage to his reputation is already done.
The rose in the teeth of my returning war hero... the moment that all hell broke loose
'He was a Royal romantic hero – so, everyone wanted to know, who was his girlfriend? All hell broke loose'
He’s a man whose efforts have been, unfairly, more often met with criticism than praise.
His decade of work as a UK Special Representative for Trade and Investment went unapplauded.
He is a war hero who, alongside the other brave men of the Falklands Task Force, risked his life for his country.
While Prince Harry is lauded for his service on the frontline in Afghanistan, Prince Andrew’s courage in the Falklands conflict is all but forgotten.
I recall the day he was pictured, victorious, disembarking from HMS Invincible with a rose between his teeth. It was the day he became irresistible to the press. He was a Royal romantic hero – so, everyone wanted to know, who was his girlfriend? All hell broke loose.
Before we attracted any media interest, we’d enjoyed a wonderful period of grace.
We used to be able to walk around London without much attention. Andrew’s private detective looking furtive in his dark suit drew more sideways glances than we did.
After the screaming headlines began, our lives were consumed by the fabricated scandals procured by chequebook journalism and the unregulated attention of dozens of paparazzi.
We were watched 24 hours a day, chased, harassed, libelled, lampooned and tormented. He was protected by thick Palace walls and Royal Protection Officers.
He was acutely aware I was on my own and did everything in his power to help. My privacy and anonymity were never to be restored.
Privacy is as essential to life as oxygen. I have not subsequently been able to make a ‘first impression’ and I understand the isolating effect of notoriety.
The press attention should have driven us apart but we gained a deeper understanding of each other through this shared experience.
The day the Falklands War was announced in April 1982, Andrew and I were due to have lunch at our favourite Italian restaurant, Mimmo d’Ischia, in Belgravia.
He telephoned me at my flat in Chester Square and said that he wouldn’t be able to come because the country was at war.
He was then attached to HMS Invincible as a Sea King search-and-rescue pilot.
I was so shocked I responded unreasonably and with anger. I slammed around the kitchen, crashing cupboard doors, shouting at him down the line that he was being ridiculous, that this was the worst excuse I’d ever heard and that I was expecting him in 15 minutes.
I threw the phone down, went out and got into my green Mini, turning the car radio on just in time to hear the BBC announcing war had been declared against Argentina.
I was so startled, I drove straight into the back of a parked Post Office van.
Leaving my car where it was, I returned to the flat where Andrew had by now arrived. He was looking pretty miserable, albeit very handsome in his uniform.
We said goodbye only after I tried everything – and I mean everything, both reasonable and unreasonable – to stop him going.
He left giving me a small volume of Kipling’s poems with a bookmark on ‘If–’, reminding me that he was one of the men and that this was his job.
I couldn’t watch him drive away. I didn’t go outside for days and sat glued to BBC World News. We were able to stay in touch with the occasional ship-to-shore call and we wrote long letters.
It was only at the time of Invincible’s eventual homecoming in September that year that I first understood what a destructive role the media would play in our relationship through the constant thirst for news and gossip about us.
Like any other military wife or girlfriend, I had planned to go to meet Andrew’s ship. Instead, I was invited to wait for him in his rooms at Buckingham Palace a few days before he docked.
Princess Diana’s treatment at the hands of the paparazzi proved the age of deference was over.
From the moment that iconic photograph of her legs visible through a backlit skirt was taken, she became the first Royal victim of modern media manipulation. I became the second, so this was a precautionary measure.
My reunion with my boyfriend took place privately in Buckingham Palace. I watched him on television disembarking in Portsmouth from the comfort of his sitting room.
It seemed like a matter of minutes before he walked in and we were together.
Then Andrew went to Balmoral for the peace and quiet and family reunion he craved.
Due to work commitments, I followed him up a few days later, catching the train from King’s Cross, laden with luggage containing virtually my complete wardrobe.
Even so, I ran out of walking socks and had to raid Prince Edward’s drawers for spares. (He was in New Zealand at the time.)
If the night at Bewicks provided me with my first lesson in royal etiquette – Royals are always first through the door – then my stay at Balmoral provided the second.
The day I arrived, I walked downstairs and into a drawing room full of courtiers who started bowing and curtseying in my direction.
I guessed it wasn’t for me and that it could only mean there was a senior Royal right behind me. I turned and saw Prince Charles, whom I hadn’t yet met.
I curtseyed, only to find him bending down to give me a kiss. I started to get back up – and in doing so headbutted him. He held his head in his hands groaning while I wilted with embarrassment.
He came towards me again and this time I got it right. He whispered kindly in my ear: ‘It’s kiss, then curtsey.’
At Balmoral, life is lived outdoors and the evenings are spent playing parlour games, doing jigsaws and pretending the dog hasn’t farted.
Suffice to say I had a memorable time – but relaxing as it is en famille, even when the family are the Royals, what we really wanted to do was to go on a beach holiday. Scotland means sweaters.
We chose Princess Margaret’s villa in Mustique because of the predictable – and worrisome – increase in press and public attention post Falklands, as well as increased security concerns.
In October, we flew British Airways under an alias reported at the time as Mr and Mrs Cambridge.
The plane stopped briefly in America to pick up some new passengers, including my mother who was joining our house party.
I’d spent some time with my boyfriend’s mother and now he was going to spend some time with mine. A normal chain of events.
Breaking her silence: Koo at home with her dog Dolly as she lifts the lid on her relationship with Andrew
It was probably the last time we could conduct anything approaching a ‘normal’ relationship.
Completely by chance, there was a Fleet Street photographer on the plane heading on holiday too.
His camera must have been in the hold because he was running up and down the aisle trying to buy one from his fellow passengers.
At this time there were no pictures of Andrew and I together in the public domain and, of course, it was long before the era of the smart phone and social media and citizen journalism.
Fortunately, no one would give the journalist a camera. I woke from a nap to find Andrew’s Royal detective had placed a blanket over my head and my boyfriend was sitting in the ****pit of the plane hidden from view.
Our romantic, home-from-the-war, reunion holiday had instantly become big news. Big news meant big money in the Eighties. And big money was as much a corrupting influence then as it is today.
Once we arrived at Les Jolies Eaux, I was almost under house arrest. It was a military operation just getting out to the private beach.
It was, however, a beautiful, airy place where we took our meals of fish and tropical fruit on the secluded terrace.
The paparazzi were flying over low in light aircraft or swimming up to the beach in scuba gear. There was a palpable sense of real physical danger. We didn’t know if the people coming at us were carrying a gun or a camera.
Actually, it was also an oddly happy time and gave rise to scenes so funny they still bear re-telling.
One involved an old friend John Hatt, for ten years the travel editor of Harper’s & Queen and founder of travel publisher Eland Books.
Hatt went to eavesdrop for us at the island’s famous Basil’s Bar, where journalists were busy trying to drink up a story.
He returned to the house via a dip in the sea off Princess Margaret’s beach where he removed his thick prescription glasses and placed them on his folded beach towel before venturing into the water.
Being very near-sighted without his spectacles, he almost swam into a large dark submerged body which he mistook for a spying paparazzi.
He was just inches from it when he realised it was a shark and had to punch it hard on the nose.
The blow stunned the fish which had been basking in the shallows and gave Hatt enough time to swim back to the beach to recuperate from the shock and to collect his thoughts and his glasses.
He wanted to run up to tell us of his amazing adventure and bravery in taking on what he thought was a paparazzi but assumed, correctly, that no one would believe him – so he grabbed a palm branch and waded back into the water to prod the shark to shore.
All the men in our house went down to the beach to inspect the kill which was then cooked and eaten. We felt a bit sorry for the shark and would rather have roasted a paparazzo.
The media thought we would crack under pressure and give them the trophy picture they wanted, or that I would cash in on my Royal relationship with a rollicking kiss’n’tell.
I turned down a written offer of £1 million from the News Of The World just to pose for a photograph and confirm that I was Prince Andrew’s girlfriend.
The harder they pushed, the more resistant I became.
What starts as sexual innuendo turns into a cruel joke, then quickly descends into a vicious verbal attack that leaves deep emotional scars.
To be publicly and falsely labelled as guilty of sexual misconduct is as wrong as flogging a woman for the crime of being raped.
It is fortuitous that I have had the spiritual guidance of his Holiness the Dalai Lama since 1990. Without it, I doubt I would have had the courage to speak out now.
But what I could never know, during that idyllic but eventful holiday, was how a film role I played years earlier was about to come back to haunt me... and change the course of my life, and my relationship with Andrew, for ever.
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