Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor became the first senior royal to be arrested in modern history when police swooped on the Sandringham estate yesterday morning.
The former duke was arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office following allegations made after the release of millions of pages of files related to paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein.
Thames Valley Police said searches were carried out on properties in Norfolk and Berkshire, including the Royal Lodge in Windsor, where Andrew lived until earlier this month.
According to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), misconduct in public office carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment.
A number of police forces across the UK are assessing information released as part of the Epstein files document dump. Officers from Surrey, Bedfordshire, Essex, Norfolk, the West Midlands, Wiltshire and Scotland have all said they are reviewing information.
Andrew has consistently and strenuously denied any wrongdoing.
Here are four scenarios of how the allegations against the former prince could unfold:
Not enough evidence to charge
Following his younger brother’s bombshell arrest, King Charles said “the law must take its course” after he learnt “with the deepest concern” about the arrest of his brother.
In a statement issued by Buckingham Palace, the King added: “What now follows is the full, fair and proper process by which this issue is investigated in the appropriate manner and by the appropriate authorities.
“In this, as I have said before, they have our full and wholehearted support and co-operation.”
Former police bosses and legal experts said that process is likely to be a lengthy one, given the complex nature of the alleged offence.
Police arrive at Mountbatten-Windsor’s new home on the Royal Family’s Sandringham estate on Thursday morning (Photo: Peter Nicholls/Getty)Dal Babu, a former Metropolitan Police chief superintendent, said the decision to arrest Andrew was “significant”.
He said: “They don’t have to arrest. They can just invite him for interview.
“I think this is going to be a slow burn. The police will want to get everything right. They know that there’s a huge amount of scrutiny on them.”
Dr Tom Frost, a senior lecturer in law at Loughborough University, said it could take “weeks, if not months” for the police to pass a file to the CPS to consider any charges.
Pressure on the CPS would be so intense that the Director Of Public Prosecutions may make a final decision of whether Andrew faces charges, he added.
“This is unprecedented in the sense that a senior member of the Royal Family is [accused of] a very serious criminal offence,” he said.
The CPS must consider an evidential test and a public interest test before making any charges.
If the threshold to bring charges cannot be reached, then Andrew will be told no further action will be taken against him.
CPS press charges over misconduct in public office
If the CPS decides to bring charges, then Andrew would either be released on bail or detained in custody pending a first appearance at magistrates’ court.
There are four “elements” that police must focus on so that prosecutors can decide whether or not to charge.
First, the police must establish the accused was a “public officer” and the incident in question was plausibly part of those duties.
Unmarked police vehicles enter the gates of the Royal Lodge (Photo: Leon Neal/Getty Images)Detectives will then look for evidence that the incident in question saw the suspect “wilfully” neglecting to perform their duty and that the action they committed was so bad that it was “an abuse of the public’s trust”.
If the evidence has passed those three tests, police need to examine whether the person under investigation acted “without reasonable excuse or justification”.
Dr Frost said: “The CPS in the past have said that there is a high bar for politicians, effectively, for people in political roles, to be charged and prosecuted with this.
“Most people convicted of this are junior officials, like prison officers or police constables. It’s very difficult to prove for a senior political official – could be a trade envoy, could be a senior politician, could be an ambassador.
“You don’t just have to prove misconduct. You have to prove that misconduct is so bad that it amounts to abuse of the public trust, which is unclear.”
Andrew questioned over further offences
In total, nine police forces and the National Crime Agency (NCA) are now assessing the DoJ release of more than 3.5 million documents linked to Epstein.
Former prime minister Gordon Brown said he submitted a five-page letter to several UK police forces, including the Metropolitan Police, Sussex Police and Thames Valley Police, providing new, additional information from the Epstein files.
He previously claimed the Epstein files showed in “graphic detail” how the financier was able to use Stansted Airport to “fly in girls from Latvia, Lithuania and Russia”.
Separately, the Met said it is also looking at allegations Andrew’s protection officers turned a “blind eye” to his visits to Epstein’s island, Little St James.
Thames Valley Police also previously said they were separately assessing allegations that a second woman was sent to the UK by Epstein for a sexual encounter with Andrew.
In 2014, the late Virginia Giuffre became the first woman to publicly make similar accusations against Mountbatten-Windsor.
The allegations raise the prospect that the former duke could be questioned by police over further offences.
Babu added that of the searches of properties linked to Andrew: “There may be some hard copies there of images, information. We know that he was a very close friend of the convicted paedophile Epstein.”
Andrew (and potentially other royals) give evidence in public
As the Royal Family is plunged into its deepest crisis in generations, the allegations pose the threat of Andrew and potentially other senior royals being forced to give evidence in public.
If Andrew was charged and continued to deny the allegations against him, the case would go to a full court trial.
Dr Frost said: “There are a lot of implications or circumstances that aren’t normally present in other investigations.
“We have the King saying that he will happily cooperate. There aren’t normally criminal investigations where the King could be a potential witness. So we are in uncharted territory.”
King Charles arrives at London Fashion Week, his first public appearance since his brother was arrested (Photo: Ilyas Tayfun Salci/Anadolu via Getty Images)Speaking before Andrew’s arrest, the Prime Minister said the ex-duke should speak to the authorities in the UK and US about the Epstein scandal.
Sir Keir Starmer said: “Anybody who has any information should testify.
“So whether it’s Andrew or anybody else, anybody who has got relevant information should come forward to whatever the relevant body is.”
Meanwhile, a US politician who called for Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor to give evidence under oath in front of Congress about his links to paedophile Jeffrey Epstein has said he hopes the former prince’s arrest will “lead to answers”.
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He said: “He (Andrew) appears repeatedly in the documents we have uncovered as having knowledge of Jeffrey Epstein’s crimes and is specifically named by victims as someone who engaged in wrongdoing.
“Yet he has continued to ignore our calls to cooperate with the Oversight Committee’s investigation.”
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