Andrew Said He Was at Pizza Express During Epstein Accuser's Claim; Internal Probe Found No Evidence He Was There

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor's long-standing claim that he was at a Pizza Express restaurant in Woking on the day Virginia Giuffre alleged they had sex could not be verified after the restaurant chain conducted an internal inquiry.

It was reported that Pizza Express examined whether there was evidence the former prince had visited its Surrey branch on 10 March 2001, the date at the centre of Giuffre's allegations. After reviewing available records and attempting to trace former staff, the company reportedly found no evidence that he had been at the restaurant. It also found no evidence that he had not been there.

Pizza Express Internal Probe

Mountbatten-Windsor made the Pizza Express claim during his widely watched 2019 BBC Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis, where he sought to rebut Giuffre's allegation that they met in London before having sex at the Belgravia home of Ghislaine Maxwell. He insisted he had instead taken his daughter, Princess Beatrice, to a children's party at the Pizza Express branch in Woking before returning home that evening. He has consistently and strenuously denied any wrongdoing.

Pizza Express quietly launched an internal review shortly after the interview because senior management considered the claim a matter of public interest. Executives reportedly searched for records dating back to 2001 while also attempting to identify former employees and local managers who may have remembered the visit.

The manager who oversaw the Woking restaurant in 2001 had already left the company and could not be interviewed. No surviving business records from that period were found, and the inquiry was unable to establish whether Mountbatten-Windsor had visited the restaurant.

Other investigations also found no record of any customer or member of staff recalling seeing him at the branch that evening. However, it's worth noting that the investigation likewise uncovered no evidence disproving his account.

Andrew's Pizza Express Claim

The Pizza Express visit became one of the defining moments of Mountbatten-Windsor's 2019 television interview. During portions of the interview that were not broadcast at the time but have since been revisited by Newsnight, he expanded on how the account had been established.

He said his staff had checked diaries and other records before the interview.

'I'd taken Beatrice to a Pizza Express in Woking,' he said. 'This has all been worked out by my staff, who've looked at the diary and everything else.'

He also explained that Sarah Ferguson was believed to have been in the United States at the time and said he had remained at home with his daughters while she was away.

Giuffre alleged she was trafficked by Jeffrey Epstein and forced to have sex with Mountbatten-Windsor on three occasions, including when she was 17 years old. One of those alleged encounters, she said, took place on 10 March 2001 after they had dined together and visited a London nightclub before travelling to Maxwell's home.

Virginia Giuffre died by suicide in April 2025 at the age of 41. Mountbatten-Windsor has repeatedly denied the allegations.

Investigation Raises Further Questions

As part of its reporting, the BBC reportedly sought information from the Metropolitan Police through a Freedom of Information request asking whether royal protection officers accompanied Mountbatten-Windsor to Woking on the day in question.

The force declined to confirm or deny whether it held such information, citing national security and longstanding policies surrounding protective security arrangements.

The response drew criticism from Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey, who questioned whether revealing whether Mountbatten-Windsor had police protection 25 years ago would genuinely create a security risk. He argued an exception should be made in the interests of transparency.