Prince Andrew is still causing a PR crisis for more than five years after he retired from public life, suggesting he’s a problem that will not go away anytime soon.

Andrew quit as a working royal over his friendship with sex offender before being sued at civil court in New York by , who said she was forced to have sex with him when she was a 17-year-old trafficking victim.

The prince settled the case out of court while protesting his innocence and was supposed to confine himself to a life out of the limelight.

However, he has been back in the spotlight after an alleged Chinese spy, Yang Tengbo, was banned from Britain in part for developing a secretive relationship with the royal.

The allegations date back to 2020, but there are passages in the court filings, seen by Regalrumination.com, that may raise significant concerns for the king, including references to getting “the relevant people unnoticed in and out of the house in Windsor” and circumnavigating around palace staff.

A spokesperson previously said: “The Duke of York followed advice from HMG [His Majesty’s Government] and ceased all contact with the individual after concerns were raised.

“The duke met the individual through official channels, with nothing of a sensitive nature ever discussed. He is unable to comment further on matters relating to national security.”

However, a secondary question looming over the whole crisis is that the public still does not know who is currently bankrolling Andrew or what they want in return.

Prince Andrew and the Siege of Royal Lodge

The prince lives in Royal Lodge, a 30-room mansion in Windsor, which is outside the police cordon that protects the castle and surrounding grounds.

As a result, it needs private security, which is said to cost millions each year, and Charles has cut his brother off financially.

The expectation was that in the absence of family money, Andrew would be forced to give up his mansion and move to the more modest Frogmore Cottage within the police cordon. Instead, he has found a financial backer willing to cough up the substantial bill for private security each year and will, therefore, remain at Royal Lodge.

It is unclear who this person is and whether or not Andrew is exercising the same kind of judgment that led him into Epstein’s home and the company of an alleged Chinese spy.

Nigel Cawthorne, author of Prince Andrew: Epstein, Maxwell and the Palace, told Regalrumination.com the police in Britain should get involved.

“Last time, with Virginia Giuffre, Scotland Yard refused to even investigate the case,” Cawthorne said.

“So it certainly should start with Scotland Yard having a look at it and them trying to find out where this money is coming from,” he said.

There have been reports that Andrew will skip the royal family’s annual Christmas celebrations at Sandringham, though the king has not entirely cut ties with his brother, who joined the royals at church as recently as Easter.

“This [scandal] certainly hasn’t made things any better,” Cawthorne said. “Andrew really needed to keep away from anything like this.

“He’s been in enough trouble already reputation-wise. There’s no real love lost between the two of them. They’ve always been rivals.

“It would be nice to have some excuse for Charles to bounce him altogether.”

Charles and Andrew have had their tensions over the years, including over the king’s efforts to slim down the monarchy, which led to the prince’s daughters, Princess Eugenie and Princess Beatrice, not becoming working royals and losing their police protection.

However, it is now 14 years since Andrew and Epstein were photographed together walking through Central Park after the financier’s criminal conviction for soliciting prostitution from a minor, which made him a registered sex offender.

The prince does not look like he will be getting any less controversial any time soon, raising questions about what influence Charles can exert over his brother.

Prince Andrew’s Relationship With Chinese Spy Yang Tengbo

Details of Prince Andrew’s relationship with Yang became public after the alleged spy was banned from Britain and appealed at the Special Immigration Appeals Commission.

A judgment dismissing Yang’s complaint quoted a letter dated March 30, 2020, to Yang from Dominic Hampshire, a senior adviser to Andrew.

It referenced Yang attending Andrew’s birthday party that month and added: “I also hope that it is clear to you where you sit with my principal and indeed his family.

“You should never underestimate the strength of that relationship, outside of his closest internal confidants, you Sit at the very top of a tree that many, many people would like to be on.”

Yang said in a statement: “I have done nothing wrong or unlawful and the concerns raised by the Home Office against me are ill-founded. The widespread description of me as a ‘spy’ is entirely untrue.”

The willingness of a representative of the prince to discuss the views of other royal family members may, though, cause some nervousness among palace aides.

The letter from Andrew’s adviser also read: “We have wisely navigated our way around former Private Secretaries (top palace advisers) and we have found a way to carefully remove those people who we don’t completely trust. Under your guidance, we found a way to get the relevant people unnoticed in and out of the house in Windsor.”

A further letter on October 22, 2020, gave Yang authority to “act on behalf of the Duke on an international financial initiative known as the Eurasia Fund in engagements with potential partners and investors in China,” the filing said.

“The letters from Mr Hampshire justify the conclusion that [Yang] won a significant degree, one could say an unusual degree, of trust from a senior member of the who was prepared to enter into business activities with him.

“That occurred in a context where, as the contemporaneous documents record, the Duke was under considerable pressure and could be expected to value [Yang’s] loyal support. It is obvious that the pressures on the Duke could make him vulnerable to the misuse of that sort of influence.”

Those pressures, though, still exist, and it may be reasonable to conclude that so does Andrew’s vulnerability now and for the foreseeable future, as long as he needs to raise millions of pounds a year to bankroll his life at Royal Lodge.

Williams Brown is chief royal correspondent for Regalrumination.com, based in London. You can find him on X, formerly , at and read his stories on Regalrumination.com‘s

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