Sarah Ferguson reportedly attempted to provide the FBI director, Kash Patel, with the phone number of socialite Lady Victoria Hervey, who has defended Prince Andrew in relation to the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. The intervention is said to have occurred in March 2025, according to an email from an FBI attaché.
An FBI attaché named David Walker sent an email to Patel on March 6, 2025, stating that Ferguson had reached out. The email indicated that Ferguson was under the impression Patel had requested the contact information for Hervey. The FBI has been investigating the Epstein scandal, a probe that has involved seizing documents and materials.
Prince Andrew has not complied with the FBI's request for an interview, despite an earlier pledge to cooperate. Lady Victoria Hervey, who briefly dated Andrew in 1999, has previously drawn criticism for her comments on the Epstein case. She has claimed that a photograph of Andrew with his arm around Virginia Giuffre, a victim of Epstein's trafficking, was faked. Hervey has also accused Epstein victims of seeking financial gain and has been critical of Giuffre. In an interview with LBC radio earlier this year, Hervey commented that not being named in the Epstein Files would be an "insult" and indicate that the person was a "bit of a loser."
Ferguson, who has faced scrutiny over her own past association with Epstein, is known for her defense of her ex-husband. The Epstein Files revealed that Ferguson maintained a close friendship with Epstein, even after his conviction for child sex offenses, and brought their daughters, Beatrice and Eugenie, to visit him after his release from prison in 2009. Emails from 2010 show Ferguson expressing feelings of trauma and loneliness to Epstein and inquiring about employment organizing his houses. In one exchange, she wrote about their mutual fondness for Andrew, stating, "I do know that my handsome Prince is a saint.. And you worship him, I do too. But then I did marry him. And still love him."
Lady Victoria Hervey, daughter of the late sixth Marquess of Bristol, has also frequently commented on the scandal. She has claimed that Epstein and Virginia Giuffre worked together to implicate Andrew and alleged that a "body double" was used to create the photograph of Andrew and Giuffre, despite admissions from Ghislaine Maxwell that the photo is genuine. US authorities have previously stated that Prince Andrew has provided "zero cooperation" with their investigation. In 2020, former US attorney Geoffrey Berman announced that prosecutors and the FBI had repeatedly contacted Andrew's lawyers regarding his commitment to assist law enforcement, but that he had "provided zero cooperation."