Spanish king’s nephew in argument at Madrid amusement park
Jun 5, 2015, 8:19 AM
MADRID (AP) — The eldest nephew of Spain’s King Felipe argued with other teens last week in a line at a Madrid amusement park, but the boy’s father on Friday denied claims his son used a racist epithet to denigrate a boy of Asian heritage.
In an interview with the digital news publication El Confidencial, Jaime de Marichalar said his 16-year-old son, Felipe Juan Froilan, was involved in a verbal dispute but never “insulted anyone nor said who he is.”
The aristocrat and banker made the comments after Spain’s El Economista business newspaper cited unnamed witnesses saying Froilan cut in line, was challenged, uttered the slur and bragged that he is fourth in line to the throne.
De Marichalar said without providing specifics that other teens tried to provoke his son but that he didn’t pay attention to them.
De Marichalar did not comment about the claim that his son cut in line for the ride at the amusement park, where workers declined to comment Thursday when asked about the May 27 incident.
El Economista’s report has generated headlines from Britain to China, but Spain’s royal palace also declined to comment about it Friday.
The teen also made headlines in 2012 when he was hospitalized at age 13 after shooting himself in the foot accidentally with a shotgun at a country estate owned by his father, who was with him at the time.
The boy, widely known in Spanish media simply as Froilan, is the son of de Marichalar and Princess Elena, the eldest of Felipe’s two sisters. The couple divorced in 2009.
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