A second woman has alleged that Jeffrey Epstein sent her to the UK to have a sexual encounter with Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, according to her lawyer.

The woman claims she spent the night with Andrew at Royal Lodge in 2010, according to Brad Edwards of the American law firm Edwards Henderson. She was in her twenties.

It is the first time an Epstein accuser has alleged a sexual encounter at a royal residence.

“We’re talking about at least one woman who was sent by Jeffrey Epstein over to Prince Andrew,” Edwards told the BBC. After the alleged encounter the woman was taken to Buckingham Palace for tea, Edwards claimed. The BBC said it could not corroborate the visit against Palace records without revealing the woman’s identity.

Edwards told the BBC he was now considering filing a civil case on the woman’s behalf, although the nature of any action is unclear.

Andrew and Edwards, who is based in Florida, did not immediately respond to requests for comment from The Sunday Times.

Virginia Giuffre was represented by Edwards before she took her own life in April. She claimed that she was made to go to London in 2001 to have sex with Andrew. She alleged she was forced to have sex with him on two other occasions, on Epstein’s private island and in New York. Andrew has consistently denied Giuffre’s claims and any wrongdoing related to Epstein.

Epstein, a convicted paedophile, killed himself in a Manhattan jail cell in 2019.

Edwards said Andrew and the second woman, who is not British, had communicated before the alleged sexual encounter. He said that he had spoken to “certain legal counsel” for the former prince but that he was “seemingly disconnected from his lawyers”.

The Florida lawyer claimed that communications with this counsel stopped after Andrew was stripped of his royal titles and told to move out of Royal Lodge by the King last year.

In the autumn Buckingham Palace said: “Their Majesties wish to make clear that their thoughts and utmost sympathies have been and will remain with the victims and survivors of any and all forms of abuse”.