Britons shrug off nude photos of partying Prince Harry

ASSOCIATED PRESS

This is a Saturday March 10, 2012 file photo shows Britain's Prince Harry after playing rugby at Flamengo's beach in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

LONDON >> Britain's Prince Harry has been caught on camera doing something embarrassing — again.

Celebrity gossip website TMZ on Tuesday posted photos of the 27-year-old royal cavorting nude with an unidentified woman in a VIP suite in Las Vegas. It's hardly the first time the prince — who allegedly disrobed as part of a game of strip pool — has been filmed misbehaving. The third-in-line to the throne was famously photographed wearing a Nazi uniform for a costume party, and in another photo-gaffe he was seen cupping the breast of a female TV presenter. Some would argue footage in which he was heard to utter a racial slur while teasing a fellow army cadet from Pakistan was more serious.

Prince Harry's office confirmed Wednesday that the photos were of the prince but declined to make any further comment.

The blurry, low-resolution photographs appear to have been snapped from inside a hotel suite, and it isn't clear that the prince was aware that they were being taken.

That could be a violation of the royal's privacy. It might also explain why Britain's scandal-hungry tabloids — normally avid consumers of titillating photos — were steering clear of the images.

Interviews with Londoners up and down the capital's Prince of Wales Road yielded few critics of Harry's antics.

"He's the prince. He can have any bird he wants!" said Craig Martin, 38, a construction worker.

Caregiver Shirley Ashard laughed at the news of Harry's naked adventure, dismissing questions about the propriety of running around a plush hotel room in the buff with a boys-will-be-boys shrug.

"I've got kids. They do things like that," the 59-year-old said. "He's a lad, for God's sake."

Ingrid Seward, editor-in-chief of Majesty magazine, said Harry's party-boy image was part of his approachable, normal persona.

"Of course it's stupid, but it doesn't make people dislike him — quite the opposite," she said.

"It shows that he is a guy who gets into trouble and he's the one people love to love. It could only happen to Harry — but we love him for it."

She did think, though, that Harry might get a talking-to from Prince Charles. "I would think his father would speak to him," she said.