The Duke of York is facing fresh controversy as a US court prepares to release a tranche of documents relating to the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. Almost 200 legal papers connected to a 2015 defamation case brought by Virginia Giuffre against Ghislaine Maxwell, in which she accused Prince Andrew of abusing her as a teenager, are due to be unsealed this week.

The case was settled out of court, but the documents will be made public following a successful legal challenge by the Miami Herald newspaper. They will include the names of about 170 associates of Epstein, among them, the Duke and Bill Clinton.

Those concerning Prince Andrew are expected to relate to the testimony of Johanna Sjoberg, who has claimed she was with the Duke and Ms Giuffre at Epstein’s New York mansion in 2001. Ms Giuffre alleged that the gathering marked one of the occasions she was forced to have sex with the Duke. Evidence from other victims may support Ms Giuffre’s claims, according to ABC News.

The Duke has vehemently denied wrongdoing and settled his civil case with Ms Giuffre out of court in 2022 with no admission of guilt. He is understood to feel sanguine about the impending developments and is not expecting to be named extensively.

Johanna Sjoberg claimed she and Virginia Giuffre accompanied Jeffrey Epstein on a visit to Prince Andrew at Balmoral. In her testimony, she alleged that she had sat on a sofa with the Duke, Ms Giuffre, and a puppet provided by Maxwell. Maxwell denied the claim, stating that she never gave the Duke a puppet. Asked if she had used the ‘caricature’ to put its hand on someone’s breast, she said, ‘I don’t recollect. I recollect the puppet but I don’t recollect anything around it.’