Virginia Giuffre, who accused Prince Andrew of sexual assault, has died aged 41.

In a statement to Sky’s US partner network NBC News on Friday, her family said she took her own life in the Perth suburb of Neergabby, Australia, where she had been living for several years.

“It is with utterly broken hearts that we announce that Virginia passed away last night at her farm in Western Australia,” her family said.

“She lost her life to suicide, after being a lifelong victim of sexual abuse and sex trafficking.

“Virginia was a fierce warrior in the fight against sexual abuse and sex trafficking. She was the light that lifted so many survivors.

“In the end, the toll of abuse is so heavy that it became unbearable for Virginia to handle its weight.”

Police said emergency services received reports of an unresponsive woman at a property in Neergabby on Friday night.

“Police and St John Western Australia attended and provided emergency first aid. Sadly, the 41-year-old woman was declared deceased at the scene,” a police spokeswoman said.

“The death is being investigated by Major Crime detectives; early indication is the death is not suspicious.”

Sexual assault claims

Ms Giuffre sued the Duke of York for sexual abuse in August 2021, saying Andrew had sex with her when she was 17 and had been trafficked by his friend, the billionaire paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

The duke has repeatedly denied the claims, and he has not been charged with any criminal offences.

In March 2022, it was announced Ms Giuffre and Andrew had reached an out-of-court settlement – believed to include a “substantial donation to Ms Giuffre’s charity in support of victims’ rights”.

‘An incredible champion’

Sigrid McCawley, Ms Giuffre’s attorney, said in a statement that she “was much more than a client to me; she was a dear friend and an incredible champion for other victims”.

“Her courage pushed me to fight harder, and her strength was awe-inspiring,” she said. “The world has lost an amazing human being today.”

“Rest in peace, my sweet angel,” she added.

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Dini von Mueffling, Ms Giuffre’s representative, also said that “Virginia was one of the most extraordinary human beings I have ever had the honour to know”.

“Deeply loving, wise, and funny, she was a beacon to other survivors and victims,” she added. “She adored her children and many animals.

“She was always more concerned with me than with herself. I will miss her beyond words.

“It was the privilege of a lifetime to represent her.”

Ms Giuffre said at the end of March she had four days to live after a car accident, posting on social media that “I’ve gone into kidney renal failure”. She was discharged from hospital eight days later.

Raised mainly in Florida, she said she was abused by a family friend early in life, which led to her living on the streets at times as a teenager.

She said that in 2000, she met Ghislaine Maxwell, a British socialite who was convicted in 2021 on federal sex trafficking and conspiracy charges and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Ms Giuffre said Maxwell then introduced her to Epstein and hired her as his masseuse, and said she was sex trafficked and sexually abused by him and associates around the world.

‘A survivor’

After meeting her husband in 2002, while taking massage training in Thailand at what she said was Epstein’s behest, she moved to Australia and had a family.

She founded the sex trafficking victims’ advocacy charity SOAR in 2015, and is quoted on its website as saying: “I do this for victims everywhere.

“I am no longer the young and vulnerable girl who could be bullied. I am now a survivor, and nobody can ever take that away from me.”

:: Anyone feeling emotionally distressed or suicidal can call Samaritans for help on 116 123 or email jo@samaritans.org in the UK. In the US, call the Samaritans branch in your area or 1 (800) 273-TALK.

The head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales has told Sky News it’s “intimidating” to be one of those responsible for choosing the next pope.

Vincent Nichols is among four UK cardinals in Rome for the Pope’s funeral on Saturday.

Following the funeral, and after nine days of mourning, cardinals from around the world will gather in the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel to cast their votes, with white smoke announcing to the world when a new pope has been elected.

Cardinal Nichols told Sky’s Anna Botting: “I hope nobody goes into this conclave, as it were, with the sole purpose of wanting to win. I think it’s very important that we go in wanting to listen to each other… It has to be together, trying to sense what God wants next. Not just for the church.”

He described the procession that took Pope Francis to lie in state as “the most moving thing I’ve ever attended here”.

Describing the Pope as a “master of the gesture and the phrase”, he also recalled the pontiff’s last journey away from the Vatican.

Cardinal Nichols said Pope Francis had visited the Regina Coeli prison, telling the inmates: “You know, except for the grace of God, it could well have been me … Don’t lose hope, God has you written in his heart.”

Read more:
How Pope Francis’s funeral will unfold
The full order of service

The Pope later told his doctor his last regret was not being able to wash the feet of the prisoners during that visit.

Becoming emotional, he also said the final message he would like to have given Pope Francis is “thank you”.

The 88-year-old died peacefully on Easter Monday, the Vatican confirmed.

Heads of state – including Sir Keir Starmer, Donald Trump and Emmanuel Macron – have all confirmed their attendance at his funeral, which takes place on Saturday at St Peter’s Square.

Prince William will attend on behalf of the King, Kensington Palace has said.

You can watch full coverage of the funeral live on Sky News on Saturday

Talking about the seating plan at the funeral, Cardinal Nichols said he understood it to be “royalty first, then heads of state, then political leaders”.

Cardinal Nichols explained event would be “exactly the same Catholic rite as everyone else – just on a grander scale”.

In a break from tradition, Pope Francis will be the first pope in a century to be interred outside the Vatican – and will instead be laid to rest at his favourite church, Santa Maria Maggiore Basilica in Rome’s Esquilino neighbourhood.

He will also be buried in just one simple wooden coffin, instead of the traditional three coffins which are usually used for pontiffs.

Born in Crosby near Liverpool, Cardinal Vincent Nichols hoped to be a lorry driver as a child – but as a teenager reportedly felt the calling to join the priesthood while watching Liverpool FC.

As cardinal, he is known for leading the church’s work tackling human trafficking and modern slavery, for which he received the UN Path to Peace Award.

He was criticised by the UK’s Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse, which said he “demonstrated a lack of understanding” of the impact of abuse and “seemingly put the reputation of the church first”.

Cardinal Nichols, responding to the findings, previously told Sky News he was “ashamed at what has happened in the context of the Catholic Church” and promised to improve the church’s response.

He has appeared to rule himself out of the running for pope, telling reporters he was “too old, not capable”.

Sky News political editor and host of the Electoral Dysfunction podcast Beth Rigby shares her London Marathon journey…

I used to say I was never going to attempt to run a marathon: too hard, too long, too much training. But later this week, I am going to join 56,000 others and run the London Marathon.

It is honestly something I never thought I would do. I took up running in my 30s, somewhere between quitting smoking and having my children. I am not a natural long-distance runner. I am neither long nor lean. At school, I was better in a sprint than cross country. But struggling to breathe as you try to run a couple of kilometres is a great motivator not to pick up a Marlboro light again. So, I persevered and in 2017 ran my first half marathon.

Since then, I have run another five half marathons. Every time I crossed the finish line, I did so in wonderment that I’d run that far and completed the race, followed by utter bafflement as to why anyone would want to put themselves through running that distance all over again. I was never going to run a marathon.

But then last summer, my dearest friend Laura died from ovarian cancer after a two-year illness. She was just 48 years old, our birthdays just six days apart. Her death was absolutely devastating for her husband and her two sons, her family and friends.

She died on June 17 in the middle of the general election campaign. I was in between presenting the Sky News Battle for No 10 election show – it was the last thing Laura watched on television – and preparing for the overnight election results show.

Laura had been seriously ill for a number of weeks, but her death was quite sudden. I found myself reeling with grief, but I had to keep going, so that’s what I did.

When I came out of the other side of that election and contemplated life without Laura, well, it was like staring into a massive black hole.

We called Laura our North Star because she was the doer and the leader. There was no one in my life as full of life and energy as Laura. She was irrepressible, infectious and very funny. She filled every room she entered, every conversation she joined, every endeavour she began.

I’m sure there will be many of you out there who have lost someone you deeply love who can relate to this – the desolation and loneliness you feel in those days and months afterwards as you try to come to terms with their absence from your daily life.

I know what Laura would have said, she’d have told me to get on with it and soon after her funeral, I quietly decided to run the London Marathon. It was my attempt to “get on with it” and in the process do something positive in Laura’s memory by raising money for the North London Hospice, who cared for her with such attention and empathy during the final stages of her life.

So this is how I went from never ever running a marathon to attempting the world’s biggest race this week and I am not doing it alone: when I told my friend Esme Wren about it – we did our first half marathon together back in 2017 – she signed up too, so we’ve been on the journey together, which has make it all a little less daunting and a little more doable.

Because marathon training – and the prospect of running for 26.2 miles – is full on, physically and mentally. For me it has involved running three times a week for 16 weeks, I have managed most of them running over 220 miles (that’s over 350km) in that time.

One is an interval run, in which you run very fast in short bursts, an easy run and then a long run. Between trying to fit in the runs, the family and being Sky News’ political editor with a very unpredictable schedule and frequent trips abroad, I have been – forgive the pun – run ragged.

Marathon training is just really time-intensive and, as BBC news presenter and runner extraordinaire Sophie Raworth told me – one massive upside of marathon training is the gang you become part of – there are no short-cuts when it comes to marathon training. You have to put in the miles, when it’s cold and dark and raining and you’d rather be doing anything else.

There was one occasion in early February when the only time I could do my long run – at this point an 8-miler – was on a Friday afternoon at 4pm. I ran down the canal path, first towards the Olympic Park in Stratford, before turning off to pick up Regents Canal towards Islington, went the wrong way and found myself lost on a deserted canal path, in the dark, being lashed by the driving rain.

I decided that this was a very bad idea and came off the canal to find I’d somehow got myself to Stepney Green Tube station. Like a modern-day Dick Whittington, I followed the City of London’s skyline to make my way home, picking up the train home from Liverpool Street (and a bottle of wine to celebrate my survival).

There is also the camaraderie. Tom Larkin, one of our brilliant producers at Sky News and a super runner, has offered all sorts of advice, from which gels to use – you take a gel every few miles into the race to refuel – to carb loading before the race.

He also pointed out to me when I was pondering why I got stomach cramping on my first 16 miler, that trying to run that far on an empty stomach lined by just an espresso was, well, suboptimal to say the least.

Sophie Raworth has been absolutely lovely and given me tonnes of advice too, from showing me great canal loops (and helping me not get lost) to giving me advice on which trainers to try.

One famous actor explained to me why I should absolutely keep to my pace and resist the adrenaline urge to go too fast at the start (his horror story about crippling lactic acid build-up in his legs at mile 20 was truly terrifying).

There is also the sheer admiration you develop for those people you know who run marathons. One former senior Labour adviser revealed to me he had run a dozen marathons when I told him of my own attempt.

I was so impressed by this that I told everyone I could about it whenever he was in my vicinity. Eventually, realising he was probably finding it a bit embarrassing, I stopped going on about it. But 12 marathons!

There are also politicians who have shared funny stories. Lord Vaizey, who raised £18,000 for charity when he ran the London Marathon in 2021, recounted how, somewhere in the depths of the race as he struggled on with an injury and a big dose of fatigue, he saw a small child pointing at him and shouting Mr Potato Head.

Ed Vaizey was rather put out by it: “I thought, who’s he calling Mr Potato Head? I don’t look like Mr Potato Head.”

Shortly afterwards, Ed was overtaken by a runner dressed up as Mr Potato Head.

Read more:
Four mistakes to avoid if you’re running the London Marathon
How the London Marathon is seeking to ‘change the face of running’

Then there’s the incredible generosity. I have been blown away by family, friends, colleagues, and complete strangers who have donated to the North London Hospice in Laura’s memory.

Hospice care is only partially funded by the government and the sector relies on charitable donations to keep it going, with a third of its funding coming from the NHS, while the rest is made up of donations and the hospice’s 17 charity shops.

Over 200 people have donated more than £11,500 to our marathon efforts. It has literally been rocket fuel in my trainers.

Too long, too hard, too much training: preparing for the marathon has felt like all of these things at different points in the past four months. But it has also been rewarding and enriching, as I achieved things I didn’t think I could and found a lovely camaraderie with fellow runners along the way.

And as for the grief, this marathon has become more than just a just a way of getting on with it, by literally putting one foot in front of the other: It has also become, through pounding the canal paths where Laura and I once walked, to the fundraising and conversations I’ve had with her family and friends about it, a way of celebrating and remembering Laura.

So, wish me luck on Sunday and if you see me running/shuffling past, give me a wave.

To follow Beth’s journey to the finish line, visit her Instagram page: https://www.instagram.com/bethrigbysky/