'Shamed' Royal Andrew Windsor Labeled 'Flight Risk' Amid Abu Dhabi Escape Fears

His 66th birthday was not, on paper at least, supposed to involve detectives. Yet multiple outlets have reported that Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office and later released 'under investigation,' a procedural limbo in the UK that allows police to continue inquiries without charge while the person remains free.

RadarOnline goes further, insisting the scandal-soaked royal is now being treated as a potential 'flight risk,' with Abu Dhabi floated as the bolt-hole of choice.​​

The fresh batch of Epstein-related documents released by the US Justice Department at the end of January has revived scrutiny of Andrew's contacts; a German-born businessman named David Stern appears repeatedly in the material and is portrayed as a logistics-minded go-between; and investigators want to locate Stern, who is said to be in Abu Dhabi, because his communications could clarify how information and access moved between Andrew and Jeffrey Epstein.​

Royal Andrew Windsor and the Abu Dhabi Escape Story

Andrew Windsor 'has sparked fears he is secretly plotting to evade justice' by sheltering 'under the coat-tails' of Stern in the Middle East. That is not a small allegation, and it arrives wrapped in the familiar packaging of unnamed insiders and ominous hypotheticals. 'If Andrew manages to flee somewhere like Abu Dhabi, it will make investigating him further very difficult,' one source one source tells RadarOnline.

Still, the geography matters even if the narrative feels overheated. Abu Dhabi is a long way from Windsor in every practical sense, and the legal mechanics of questioning a witness or compelling cooperation get slower, costlier, and more political once you are outside UK jurisdiction. Locating Stern in the UAE would add 'legal and diplomatic complications' to any attempt to speak to him 'officially.'

Royal Andrew Windsor, David Stern, and the Paper Trail

The more solid portion of this story sits not in talk of last-minute flights, but in what's described as a dense email trail. Stern was named more than 7,400 times in the latest tranche of Epstein files and says the documents show Stern corresponding with Epstein over several years, including after Epstein's 2008 conviction and after Andrew publicly claimed he had ended contact.​

Some of the quoted language is startling in its own right. In a 2016 email, Stern wrote to Epstein: 'I am always on your team!' and elsewhere referred to Epstein as his 'boss' and a 'good friend.' Emails also show Stern updating Epstein on Andrew's movements, using 'PA' to refer to the former Duke of York and sharing itineraries tied to trade trips.​

Those trips are not incidental detail. Stern accompanied Andrew on taxpayer-funded trade missions in September and October 2010 to Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shenzhen while Andrew served as the UK's Special Representative for International Trade and Investment, and suggests Stern arranged meetings during the visits raising questions about propriety if introductions were routed through Epstein.

Stern's proximity to royal institutions, at least socially, also features heavily. Stern later became a director of Andrew's Pitch@Palace initiative in 2016 and was photographed sitting alongside Queen Elizabeth II at an event at St James's Palace that year.

In an email, Sir Claude Hankes pushed back on any implication of closeness to the late monarch; 'To suggest as you do... that Mr Stern is a contact of the Queen is absurd. The Queen does not have contacts, believe me. How anybody could have thought this defies logic. He may be known to the Duke of York.'​

And then there is the Buckingham Palace visit detail, almost petty in isolation, unsettling in context. Stern secured 'short notice' approval for Epstein's then-girlfriend, Karyna Shuliak, 26 at the time, to visit Buckingham Palace in April 2016; Epstein, replied; 'I appreciate what you have planned,' and Stern answered; 'My pleasure. I am always on your team!!'​

Andrew, 'has always denied wrongdoing' in relation to his links with Epstein. The problem for him now is that denials don't erase logistics because if investigators are indeed following the connective tissue of who arranged what, who briefed whom, and who smoothed doors open, the loudest evidence is rarely a confession; it's the calendar invite.​