The mystery man who links Andrew with Jeffrey Epstein

In the high-tech megacity of Shenzhen in southern China, Prince Andrew looked on as dancers spun and waved streamers to entertain an audience of investors and innovators.

It was spring 2019, a gala dinner for the Chinese arm of his start-up competition Pitch@Palace – which turned out to be the last.

Within a year, the then-prince would step back from royal life after a disastrous interview about his links with the convicted American sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein.

There was a third man in this drama, little known to almost everyone, who was at the event, glimpsed in a brief shot in the official highlights video – David Stern.

Warning: this article contains language and details that may offend some readers

For nearly a decade, Stern had acted as a key conduit between the two, making connections for them both in the country he knew well, seen as a land of opportunity and potential riches – China.

The publication of millions of pages of documents relating to Epstein by the US Department of Justice this year cast new light on this enigmatic German businessman.

They suggest that it was Epstein who first brought Stern into the orbit of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Sarah Ferguson, and reveal how deeply connected Stern was with both Yorks and the convicted American sex offender.

They apparently show how he made introductions, passed on documents, pitched deals, helped to sort out Ferguson's debts, and made numerous derogatory remarks about women.

"I stay in the background/hidden, just make the arrangements," he apparently wrote to Epstein in 2011, in one of those emails – and eight years later that's still how he worked.

Stern has been approached for comment. He has not responded.

His name appears in more than 7,000 of the DOJ's recently released files, from 2008 to 2018.

Based in London for most of that time, Stern ran his own business, but he often called Epstein "boss".

He appeared to ingratiate himself into royal circles too, becoming a director of Pitch@Palace in 2016, and being appointed to the board of a royal charity, St George's House.

But he kept a low media profile, and little is known for certain about his background.

His entries on Companies House say he was born in 1978.

According to a short biography he apparently sent to Epstein, he studied Law and Chinese Law at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. A person familiar with the matter said Stern had completed a three-year Law BA there in 2000, but withdrew from a postgraduate research programme in 2003.

The biography says he is a fluent Mandarin Chinese speaker, and studied in Taiwan and China in the 1990s. He worked at a small investment banking firm, Ermgassen & Co, from 2000 to 2002. He then founded a Beijing-based IT healthcare business, Asia Gateway.

He claims he sold a majority stake in the company to the UK publishing and events giant Informa in 2010, and continued to work for them. Informa confirmed to the BBC that it bought the stake, but said "no product ever came to market from this and the agreement expired in 2014".

The earliest-known contact between Epstein and Stern came in May 2008, according to the DOJ files. They include a note to Epstein's personal assistant Lesley Groff, inviting him to invest in a "China-focused private equity fund".

The relationship blossomed despite Epstein's guilty plea to a conviction for soliciting prostitution from a minor the following month. Over the next two years his emails were a stream of investment ideas and lewd references to women.

Epstein, 15 years older, massively richer and deeply connected with elite circles in the US, is clearly the senior partner, with Stern coming across as the young student, always eager to impress.

Many of the emails are variations of Stern asking "when can I call you?" Stern calls the American "my mentor", and even "my general".

Epstein advises him on the sale of his healthcare business, and chides him for not being careful enough in checking out the background of a new contact.

Stern keeps up a steady stream of references to women and sex, often using the abbreviation "P", which Stern apparently used to refer to women. It is believed to be an abbreviation of the word "pussy", a term Epstein often used.

Epstein mostly fires back terse, business-like, poorly punctuated replies - if any.

For instance, in 2009, Stern apparently describes a Beijing dinner at the house of a friend who made a "fortune in steel".

"Entertainment during dinner were 5 girls on the dining table... while we ate. Welcome to the new china!" an email reads.

In 2010, he appears to propose a visit to Little Saint James, Epstein's Caribbean island where many of his crimes against women were committed.

"if i want action i come to LSJ - my friend J will have plenty of P for me...(so i hope!)," he writes to Epstein.

It's not clear from the emails if he ever went.

How Stern met Andrew and Sarah Ferguson

Correspondence in the DOJ files suggests that it was through Epstein that Stern was first introduced to the Yorks.

In February 2010, an email from "Sarah" to someone identified simply as "A" reads: "I was introduced to David Stern by Jeffrey. He came to Royal lodge for dinner. He has been helping me a great deal with an ear and advice to my way ahead. He has a great roladex [sic] for China."

Given the reference to Royal Lodge – Andrew's home in Windsor – it seems likely that it is from Ferguson.

Stern then writes to "Your Royal Highness" saying "The Duchess" has asked him to get in contact, and asking how he "may be of help".

That email doesn't specify what "matter" he's referring to, but since 2009, Stern, Epstein, and Sarah Ferguson had been engaged in a long and painful wrangle about her acute financial troubles.

Ferguson appeared to ask Epstein for help with her debts, which she estimated at £6m, the emails suggest, and Stern took on the task of persuading her to try to figure out what she owes and to whom.

In private, Stern and Epstein were extremely disrespectful to Ferguson.

"Unbelievable what it takes to get basic info," Stern writes. Epstein suggests treating her like a "girlfriend who has cheated" – Stern replied to say the approach is "working".

Mountbatten-Windsor himself got involved, and apparently wrote to another friend later that year that he had a "handle on the debt situation".

Building on this new relationship, Stern wrote to Epstein and suggested setting up a business in London, for "high net worth individuals, targeting Chinese =but not exclusively)".

"We very discreetly make PA a part of it and use his 'aura and access'," he wrote. Stern often appears to refer to the then-Prince Andrew as PA.

As with many of Stern's suggestions, it doesn't appear to have borne fruit.

Nonetheless, his relationship with Mountbatten-Windsor appears to have deepened and grown.

Mountbatten-Windsor had to publicly distance himself from Epstein, following the latter's conviction in 2008, but Stern acts as a go-between, forwarding documents and intelligence from Andrew.

He apparently accompanied Mountbatten-Windsor on some of his international, taxpayer-funded trips as a trade envoy, using his Chinese connections to open doors.

One email claims that the pair visited China in October 2011. "Most meetings by now are organised by me except mayors and governors," he wrote. The Court Circular confirms that Andrew was in China that month in his official capacity.

In 2016, he was placed on the board of the then-prince's start-up competition, Pitch@Palace. He was photographed sitting next to the Queen at a Pitch@Palace event.

Pitch@Palace was later involved in a storm of controversy after the co-founder of the China arm, Yang Tengbo, was banned from the UK because he was suspected of being a spy – which he denies.

Yang was seen sitting next to Mountbatten-Windsor at the 2019 Gala Dinner in Shenzhen.

Stern was also appointed to the board of St George's House Trust, an institution set up by the late Duke of Edinburgh to advance "moral, religious and social understanding".

Some board members apparently had misgivings about Stern's appointment, given the lack of clarity about his background, according to a recent Daily Telegraph story, but the appointment was pushed through anyway. St George's House did not respond to a request for comment.

The same year, Stern asked the convicted sex offender to be godfather of his newborn child. Epstein declined, saying he had promised his goddaughter he "would not be godfather to anyone else".

Stern's knowledge of China – and the access he offered – appears to have been a key factor in his appeal to both Epstein and Mountbatten-Windsor, throughout their relationship.

In 2009, while the Western world was recovering from the financial crisis, China's fast-growing economy was seen by many as a land of opportunity – including Epstein.

That year, Stern pitched to Epstein the idea of opening an investment office in London – which would have "no 'obvious' link to China on the outside, but is extremely China focused".

Stern claimed to have been very well connected in China. In one 2011 email he apparently claims to be friends with Louis Cheung, the president of Ping An, one of the world's largest insurance companies, and Alvin Jiang, the grandson of the former president Jiang Zemin. Stern claims to have met Levin Zhu, the son of the former premier Zhu Rongji.

It's not clear if he did actually have these connections – and there is no suggestion these Chinese contacts met Epstein. Appearing in the Epstein files is not an indication of wrongdoing.

Epstein's ability to operate in China was limited since he was denied a visa because of his conviction, the files suggest.

Stern suggested he apply again in a different city - Paris - and not mention his conviction, an email apparently says.

It "will be better not to tick the boxes re being denied previously or criminal charges", he apparently tells an Epstein associate, whose name is redacted.

Stern's appetite for dealmaking remained undimmed throughout the 2010s.

In 2015, he represented China's largest property company, Evergrande, in an attempt to take over the UK housebuilder Cala Homes, though the deal never went ahead. Evergrande later collapsed, sending shockwaves through the country's economy.

Stern also co-invested in an electric vehicle start-up called Canoo, with Li Botan, the son-in-law of a former senior communist party official. It went bust last year.

Stern and Epstein even discussed a fanciful plan to take over the giant German lender Deutsche Bank with the help of Qatari investors, the emails suggest - which never came to fruition.

The BBC has made multiple attempts to contact Stern, and his current whereabouts are unknown. In 2023, he changed his country of residence listed on Companies House from China to the United Arab Emirates.

The BBC has previously contacted Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Sarah Ferguson multiple times in connection with their links to Epstein and Stern, but they have not responded. Mountbatten-Windsor has consistently denied any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein.

The files suggest that Stern met Epstein in person in November 2018, and stayed in one of his New York properties.

Their correspondence appears to continue to the end of that year, much as it had for the previous decade - thoughts about China, deal ideas, references to "P", a note about "PA", and the same question Stern was always asking: "When can I call you?"