A woman who met the Duchess of Sussex at a surprise walkabout in Windsor has hit back at claims she was paid to be there and described her as 'beautiful' and 'genuine' after their 'short but sweet' interaction.
Isabelle Charters, a 24-year-old woman from Windsor, denied the 'crazy' claims that their interaction was a 'PR stunt' and that she was 'planted' in the crowd - insisting she was incredibly excited to meet Meghan. The woman was stood next to another girl, 14-year-old Amelka Zak, who hugged the Meghan in the crowd, and has since garnered a lot of media attention thanks to her surprise exchange with the Duchess.
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The footage of the Amelka hugging Meghan circulated widely online as many people were stunned by the 11th hour visit from the Sussexes which was instigated by the Prince William very last minute.
Isabelle posted her own footage of the meet on TikTok, which captures the heartwarming moment that the Duchess hugged Amelka before she spoke to Meghan herself, where she audibly gasped and called her 'so beautiful'. The video has amassed more than 30 million views on the app to date.
Owing to the large media attention around the clip, Isabelle has taken to TikTok once more to open up about her experience meeting Meghan and has denied claims that she knew Amelka beforehand or was set up 'by Meghan's PR team'.
"I have actually lived in Windsor my whole life. I was out that day in Windsor with my dad, my brother and my boyfriend," she explained.
"The girl who ended up hugging Meghan, I have never met in my life. I have no relationship with this girl, I am not associated with her. We were purely next to each other by chance in the crowd. We were total strangers
"We did end up bonding over the fact that we were both really excited to see Meghan. I think out of the people around us, we were the two that were the most excited about it"
Isabelle then continues to hit back at the people who claim her interaction was staged, insisting quite the opposite as according to her, the Duchess was 'genuine and so kind'.
"I have seen videos and articles saying that I am this girl’s mother, saying that Meghan's PR team paid for me to be there.
"I was planted in that spot, that I knew Meghan from before form the Invictus Games."
One woman named Genevieve claimed on Twitter that Isabelle was the same woman who was spotted with Meghan at the Invictus Games, but they are two different people.
She wrote: "Can someone help me understand this? Same woman, yet it was made to look spontaneous".
Isabelle denied that it was a 'set up', pointing out that she was not the woman from the Invictus Games and calling the accusations 'crazy'.
The 24-year-old also slammed a body language expert who claimed she was a paid actor in the crowd.
"So ultimately I wanted to show that the experience and interaction we had with Meghan was really lovely and genuine and she was so kind to us. Even though it was short it, was really sweet," she concluded.
More than 1,000 people took to the comments section on Isabelle's post, with one saying: "They're all miserable... Meghan is loved and she's a good human being, don't mind the haters".
Another wrote: "Thank you so much for posting this! You're lucky for meeting Meghan".
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