When Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested at about 08:00 on Thursday, it had nothing to do with Virginia Giuffre, the woman who accused him of sexual abuse.
What led to him being arrested started with information that came out in the massive Epstein file release in January, around activities while he was a trade envoy for the British government. But it will not have stopped there.
It was emails in those files that seem to be between Andrew and the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein that led to Thames Valley Police getting involved.
One email in particular stood out. In November 2010, after Andrew had returned from a UK government-funded trip to Asia, he was sent a series of country reports relating to his trip.
Within five minutes of receiving them he seems to have forwarded them to Epstein, who had by this point already been convicted and spent time in prison for sex offences.
