New photo in Epstein files appears to show Andrew with head near woman’s lap

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor appears to have been pictured reclining across the legs of five people with his head near a woman’s lap in a huge document dump related to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein.

In the undated image, which is a photograph of a picture in a photo frame, convicted sex trafficker Ghislaine Maxwell appears to peer down and smile at the former duke, who is smiling with his eyes closed.

A trove of documents, including court records, footage and images, was uploaded on Friday night to the US Department of Justice website, which held users in a queue as it experienced an “extremely high volume of search requests”.

The data dump came after US deputy attorney general Todd Blanche said “several hundred thousand” documents from the so-called “Epstein files” would be released ahead of a legal deadline.

He said the need to protect the victims of sex offender Epstein meant thousands more would be released over the coming weeks.

The US Department of Justice are legally obligated to make all files related to the investigation into Epstein public by midnight on Friday following the passing of the Epstein Files Transparency Act.

The paedophile financier was found dead in his cell at a federal jail in Manhattan, New York, in August 2019 while he awaited trial on sex trafficking charges. His death was ruled a suicide.