French prosecutors want to interview a British woman as part of their rape investigation into Pippa Middleton's father-in-law, The Mail on Sunday has learned.
Former racing driver and entrepreneur David Matthews, 81, is accused of grooming and assaulting a 15-year-old girl on the French Caribbean island of St Barts in 1998 and then raping her in Paris a year later.
It is understood France has formally asked the Home Office to arrange an interview with the woman - not the victim - as a potential witness.
A source in the Paris prosecutor's office said: 'The judicial investigation is ongoing.'
'Requests for international assistance are under way with the British authorities.'
Other sources in the French capital say prosecutors appear determined to conclude the case this year. A female investigating judge - the fourth to oversee the case - was appointed last September and is said to have 'instilled the investigation with new impetus'.
Next month marks eight years since multi-millionaire Matthews was arrested at Paris Orly airport as he got off a plane from St Barts, where he and his wife Jane, 77, own Eden Rock, a luxury resort. Although the investigation was held up by Covid, it is not clear why it has dragged on for so long.
After his arrest Matthews was charged with 'rape of a minor by a person with authority over his victim', which carries a maximum 15-year jail sentence in France.
Since then he has co-operated fully with prosecutors and has been interviewed several times. He strenuously denies the allegations. The alleged victim, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, is British and now in her 40s. The statute of limitations for prosecuting rape in France was 20 years at the time of Mr Matthews' arrest, which could have made the charges inadmissible.
In 2018, the limit was extended to 30 years for cases involving under-18s. At the time a spokesman for Matthews said he 'categorically denies the allegation and unequivocally contests the untrue and scandalous accusation'.
A family source insisted after Matthews' arrest that he had been 'set up' to humiliate him and his family, just months after his financier son James married Prince William's sister-in-law Pippa in 2017.
In an interview with The Mail on Sunday a year later, the alleged victim's father said his daughter was deeply hurt by what she considered an attempt to cast her as a fantasist. 'The idea that she is doing this for compensation, or for any other reason than a desire for justice, is completely wrong,' he added. He said his daughter had confided in her parents three years earlier.
'She told me, 'You don't know what I've been going through all these years'. Then it all came pouring out.'
He added: 'We are all behind her and believe her. She had the courage to speak out - and she did, and by doing so she feels she can give herself some sense of closure.'
Before David Matthews' arrest the gilded Matthews clan's lowest moments normally came courtesy of their younger son, Spencer, who is married to Irish media personality Vogue Williams.
To his family's mortification, Spencer once boasted of drug use, orgies and having 1,000 sex partners. He was labelled reality TV show Made In Chelsea's resident idiot.
His father David, the son of a Yorkshire coal miner, is a self-made man who enjoys the title Laird of Glen Affric (his 10,000-acre Scottish estate) and has homes in London, France and on St Barts.
A spokesman for David Matthews declined to comment.