What did the Royal Family know and when?

[LifeIsTooShort247]

With everything that has emerged about Andrew and Epstein, and now the allegations concerning Thomas Markle, I think there are some much bigger questions about what the Royal Family and Palace officials knew, when they knew it, and what they did with that information.

We are looking at two very different situations involving serious allegations of sexual abuse. One concerns a member of the Royal Family itself, Andrew, and the other concerns the father of someone who married into it, Thomas Markle.
In Andrew's case, there are still so many unanswered questions about the extent of the late Queen's knowledge, the protection he received over the years and the role played by senior courtiers. Who knew what, how far back did that knowledge go, and who made the decisions about how matters were handled?

Now with Thomas Markle. What I find particularly interesting is that the Metropolitan Police have confirmed the letter was passed to the office of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in January 2019, rather than simply being handed privately to Meghan. At that time, Harry and Meghan were still part of the Kensington Palace household structure, which they shared with William and Catherine. Jason Knauf was communications secretary for both couples.

Given the seriousness and sensitivity of the allegations, surely it is reasonable to question whether the matter was discussed with senior Palace officials or brought to the attention of senior members of the Royal Family?

Who within the office received the correspondence? Who handled it? Was Jason Knauf aware? Were William and Catherine briefed? Did the Queen or her private secretary know anything about it?

We don't know the answers, and I'm not suggesting that everyone necessarily knew. But that is precisely the point.

The circumstances involving Andrew are different, but both situations raise questions about how sensitive information was handled within the royal institution.

What did the Royal Family know, when did they know it, and what did they do with that knowledge?

Surely these are questions worth asking of the institution with regards to both situations.

Actually they can be entitled to protect people and prevent further crimes. It depends on the context.

I am a little worried about your grasp of GDPR.

Yes, information can be shared if there is a legitimate reason - I.e. a lawful basis. The lawful bases are clearly defined. Which of the six lawful bases would you say covers this letter being shown to the Sussexes or their household?

We shall never know for sure

Yes 'vital interests' is one lawful basis - to protect someone's life.

But Meghan's life wasn't at risk so that wasn't a legitimate reason to share the letter.

there’s no way anyone of sound mind would read such allegations and just remain quiet because their employer said so, I’d take it further up straight away , and besides it was still technically a joint office even though separate personnels were handling separate households.

I think you are underestimating the cumulative impact of bullying on behaviour at work. Although we haven't read the letter, at the time it was received, it would have had much less of an impact than it has had with hindsight ie the ramblings of an alcoholic ex wife 40+ years on. Plus the belief that the claim was being investigated. Separate staff Christmas parties indicates very little if any communication between the two teams.

The two situations are completely different, and the OP is an attempt to conflate them.

The issue with Andrew is that he was allowed to live the entitled.life of a rich waste of space, bankrolled and sheltered from the law by his mother.

The issue with the letter sent to Meghan by the Met is that they only communicated with her, asked her to keep shtum, and then let the matter drop. This is an egregious failure on the part of the police.

It doesn't matter who handled the letter, who knew its contents, etc. When a body such as the Met informs you of allegations such as the ones against Markle Sr, you assume they are conducting serious inquiries and are collaborating with other law enforcement bodies as needed. Nobody else needed to do anything. In particular, no publicity was needed, and in fact it seems Meghan was warned against any revelation of the allegations.

Disagree. Jason Knauf was the Communications Secretary for both H&M and W&C at this time.

This was a hugely sensitive issue back then - arguably much more sensitive than now as the AMW crisis was in full chaos. Samantha Cohen was also their PS after being with QE2 for 2 decades - so it’s a real possibility that this was shared upstream.

There may be nothing nefarious in sharing sensitive and relevant information internally with specific stakeholders as an FYI.

It would matter if the egregious failure by the Met was because they were leant on by BP.

Yep

I think both are possibilities, but we don't know. If the then Cambridges knew, I struggle with the idea that it wouldn't have been followed up via the Met. Unless the 'quiet word' to the Met came from higher up.

The Met received information about Jimmy saville that they did not investigate. I don't struggle at all with the idea the Met failed to pass on information about Thomas Markle because he was a royal members father.

The Met has also dragged its heels on investigating Andrew.

As I have pointed out, the Met is not 'internal' to the Royal Household, and vice versa. Therefore there needs to be one of six lawful reasons for sharing info.

Preventing embarrassment isn't one of them.

Yes, I agree.

And Savile was very chummy with the RF too.

A lot would depend on whether the entire household was a hotbed of gossip or whether there were lines between various or shared roles that were not crossed.

That being said, at some point, the queen found herself up to her armpits in Andrew's business, and there are an alleged £12 million reasons to believe her office took charge of that.

What rubbish. Thomas Markle isn’t anything to do with the RF.

Marina Hyde-no fan of Harry or Megan- is interesting on this subject.https://open.substack.com/pub/marinahyde/p/the-met-polices-stunning-lack-of?r=cltt6&utm_medium=ios

And a plausible scenario is the the Office of the Sussexes (at the time part of the Royal Household and subject to royal discipline ) knew and what they had was dynamite to explode in the heart of the RF and sat on it and put it in the pile of too hot to handle let's bury it. That would be institutional failure and a bigger scandal than outsider Megan fucks up which is to be expected.

Not really plausible that a staffer wouldn't show their principal such a significant piece of correspondence, especially if they believed the Met's assertion of an investigation being in hand.

But that's precisely the point. You're assuming the information stopped with Meghan.

Jason Knauf wasn't some junior press bod. He was Communications Secretary to William and Kate from 2015 and subsequently had the same role covering Harry and Meghan as well. So he was hardly an obscure figure sitting in a corner somewhere. He had a senior role spanning both couples and was in a position to know what was going on across both households. He later became William and Kate's Senior Adviser and CEO of the Royal Foundation.

The Sussexes were still being supported by Kensington Palace when this letter arrived in January 2019, before the separate household arrangements were completed.I'm not saying William, Charles or anyone else definately knew about the letter. We simply don't know. But Meghan being shown it hardly proves nobody else was aware of it. Given the personnel involved and the arrangements at the time, why are you so certain it went no further? That's the bit I find rather curious.

I am not certain about anything. How could I know?

Of the hypotheses, I think it going no further than Meghan is one of the more convincing, because she has form in controlling her own narrative, because of the bullying allegations, because she had already cut him off, because the testimony of an alcoholic ex-wife is easy to dismiss, and because no-one wants to think their father may be a paedophile or have others know their father is under suspicion.

Samantha Cohen Private Secretary with a hot line to QE2 is the lighting rod. She was definitely put in that role to keep close tabs on MM - because why on earth having served 2 decades with the top dog as Private Secretary would she be seconded to the lowly position of supporting the 6th in line of succession.

SC was on reconnaissance manoeuvres in that job - same as JK (he’d already reported her bullying by Sept 2018) - so she was tasked with reporting upwards IMHO.

Meghan is a potential victim

It could be RF interference, plain incompetence or (it being the Met police) institutional misogyny and contempt for the victims.