This weekend, there were more revelations concerning Prince Andrew. The Mail on Sunday reported how, in 2011, Andrew asked his bodyguard to investigate his accuser Virginia Giuffre. This, allegedly, was to “dig up dirt”. The Metropolitan Police is now investigating those claims.

Giuffre, who committed suicide earlier this year, was a victim of Jeffrey Epstein’s and claimed she was trafficked for sex with the Prince in 2001. Andrew continues to deny this. For the Metropolitan Police, who provide royal bodyguards, this presents a dilemma. Senior officers will hope the protection officer quietly ignored Andrew’s request. Otherwise, the current investigation will explode into a full-scale case looking at who helped Andrew do what and in what circumstances. If that happens, there will be extremely uncomfortable questions about the royal family’s taxpayer-funded protection arrangements.

As we have seen with Prince Harry’s legal action, the royal family values the expertise — and convenience — of police bodyguards, who are viewed as honorary members of the household. In effect, servants. A few “go native”, identifying themselves as royal, rather than public, employees. Others keep their feet on the ground. I once undertook anti-hijack driving training with several protection officers. Although famously discreet, occasionally the mask slipped. I remember much talk of Prince Andrew’s insistence on driving himself everywhere — extremely fast. In fact, virtually every horror story I’ve heard from bodyguards involves the former Duke of York.

What, then, of this allegation? The officer concerned would have protocols to follow following such a request. This makes the job of the Met’s Directorate of Professional Standards (DPS) easier. As a US citizen, it would be unlikely for Giuffre to feature on UK police systems. In 2011, protection officers would have to submit intelligence through a dedicated unit. Back then, such requests would be serviced by SO1 and SO15 — the Met’s political protection and counterterrorism commands respectively. This would have left an audit trail.

Of the criticisms one might lay at the Met’s door, auditing its intelligence systems isn’t one of them. I served on DPS back in 2011. Our intelligence unit had an excellent team of analysts and researchers, more than capable of tracing an individual officer’s data use back to the mid-Nineties. Anyone, in fact, who searched for Giuffre’s details, is identifiable on the CRIMINT system.

The Met, therefore, will know if there’s any substance to these allegations. Should they prove to be true, technically there are breaches of the Data Protection Act, and a raft of misconduct matters. Which will almost certainly be blamed on the protection officer. Andrew’s defence would likely turn on his “genuinely held belief” there were security reasons for looking into Virginia Giuffre. Which is where the nub of the problem lies: were the protocols for managing royal requests for police information appropriate? What are they now? And, crucially, did Andrew make other such requests? Since 2015 all bodyguard functions have been brigaded into RaSP, the Royalty and Specialist Protection Command. RaSP has a dedicated intelligence unit, through which such requests are managed.

This leaves us with a final issue: Prince Andrew’s attitude to “the rules”. A reputation for entitlement precedes him. His email to an aide, proving he passed Giuffre’s details to his bodyguard, is a matter of public record. Should the Met’s research show any inappropriate activity, will he face consequences? Until recently, the answer would probably have been “no”. However, as skeletons tumble from Andrew’s princely closets, will any former protection officers step forward?

I doubt many retired coppers will accept being “thrown under a bus” for an increasingly beleaguered and discredited Prince. If they do, then the headache for Andrew might just have begun.