Prince Harry grew emotional as he took the stand at London’s High Court on Wednesday in his privacy case against the publisher of U.K. tabloid Daily Mail, claiming that it’s been a “traumatic experience” that has made his wife Meghan Markle’s “life an absolute misery.”
The Duke of Sussex, who stepped away from royal duties in 2020 alongside Markle, was originally expected to give evidence in court on Thursday. However, his testimony was moved up after Antony White, the defense lawyer for Daily Mail publisher Associated Newspapers Limited, delivered his opening statement quicker than expected. Harry is one of several big names — including Elton John and his husband David Furnish, Elizabeth Hurley and Sadie Frost — taking on the publisher, alleging that the company engaged in illegal activities like phone-hacking and hiring private investigators to place listening devices inside cars. Associated Newspapers has denied the allegations, calling them “preposterous” and saying they were brought to court too late.
Harry’s claims specifically reference 14 articles published by Associated Newspapers titles between 2001 and 2013. As reported by BBC News, when questioned by White why he didn’t complain about his treatment in the press — specifically the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday — earlier, Harry responded that he “wasn’t allowed to complain” when he was a working member of the royal family, which he calls “the institution.”
In his witness statement, which Harry did not deliver in person but was published as his questioning began, the prince wrote that his “uneasy relationship” with the press began after the 1997 death of his mother, Princess Diana, when he was 12 years old.
“As a member of the Institution the policy was to ‘never complain, never explain.’ There was no alternative; I was conditioned to accept it,” Harry wrote, according to BBC News. “For the most part, I accepted the interest in my performing my public functions. However, in late 2016, when my relationship with Meghan, my now wife, became public, I started to become increasingly troubled by the approach of not taking action against the press in the wake of vicious persistent attacks on, harassment of and intrusive, sometimes racist articles concerning Meghan.”
He added in the witness statement that many articles made him “paranoid beyond belief” and alleged that the publications sought to “drive me to drugs and drinking to sell more of their papers.” He also said that he was “extremely upset” by a 2006 article detailing his and Prince William’s reactions to the publication of a photo of Princess Diana after her fatal car crash. “If Associated was willing to publish this type of material, then it really makes me wonder how far they are prepared to go,” Harry wrote, adding that the information in the article made him think journalists “were plainly listening in to our calls.”
Harry was questioned about specific Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday journalists while on the stand, alleging in his witness statement that some instances “felt like full-blown stalking” and “constant surveillance.” He claimed that Mail on Sunday foreign correspondent Barbara Jones would “turn up in the most bizarre places” and said it was “very suspicious” that she would know where he was, particularly when he was in Africa.
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According to BBC News, the judge interrupted Harry twice to remind him not to argue the case himself when responding to questioning.
After White’s questioning, the claimants’ lawyer, David Sherborne, allowed Harry to speak more about how Associated Newspapers’ alleged actions have impacted his life. According to BBC News, Harry called it a “traumatic experience” to recount the contents of the articles.
“Having my life, like others, commercialized in this way since I was a teenager, delving into every single aspect of my private life, listening into calls, blagging flights, so that they could find out where I’m going … To sit here and go through this all over again and have them give their own defense and claim that I don’t have any right to any privacy is disgusting,” Harry said (via BBC News).
He then grew visibly emotional, saying that his life has only “got worse, not better” in the process of suing Associated Newspapers and that they have “made my wife’s life an absolute misery.”
This marks Harry’s third time suing a major newspaper group, having previously taken legal action against The Sun owner News Group Newspapers, which settled before trial, as well as The Mirror Group, a case in which he was awareded £140,600 in damages. Harry’s testimony during his 2023 trial against The Mirror Group made history, as he became the first royal in 130 years to testify in court.
Sherborne alleged in his opening statement that “there was clear, systematic and sustained use of unlawful information gathering at both the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday.” White countered that the group is “clutching at straws” and that information in some of the stories had been published previously, with some of it coming from friends of the claimants who became sources for journalists.
From Variety US