Without his wife, Meghan Markle, a fearless Prince Harry made a surprise visit to London on Tuesday.
The Duke of Sussex has joined a long list of high-profile celebrities, including actresses Sadie Frost and Elizabeth Hurley, filmmaker David Furnish, and Doreen Lawrence, in a lawsuit against Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL), the publisher of the Daily Mail.
Prince Harry and the other famous stars dragged the company to London’s High Court over claims that it obtained unlawful information to grab headlines and make billions.
According to court documents, Prince Harry and the other celebrities believe that the media outlet invaded their privacy by “placing listening devices in victims’ homes and cars, bugging phone calls, and paying police for information.”
The suit claims that the alleged unlawful activity ran from 1993 to 2018.
A spokesperson for Prince Harry told Reuters: “The Duke of Sussex wanted to be present to signal public support for the case. In other words, he attended to shine a spotlight on the case.”
The lawsuit against ANL is just one of the many that the Duke of Sussex has brought against the British press.
Prince Harry shared an embarrassing chapter in Spare that involved him turning to King Charles III and the heir to the throne when he and Markle desperately needed advice over a leaked letter.
The Duke of Sussex confirmed that when his father-in-law, Thomas Markle, published via the Mail On Sunday a deeply intimate letter that he received from the Duchess of Sussex, he wanted to sue the media outlet.
He asked King Charles and Prince William for advice because they had attacked the British media in court for invading their privacy.
Prince Harry exposed the King and heir by writing: “Meg wanted to sue. Me too. Rather, we both felt we had no choice. If we didn’t sue over this, we said, what kind of signal would that be sending? To the press? To the world? So we conferred again with the Palace lawyer. We were given a runaround. I reached out to Pa and Willy.”
Prince Harry went on to blast Prince William and King Charles for being hypocrites who used the justice system when they needed it yet told him to stay down and not defend his wife.
The former soldier further bashed and mocked his brother and father for behaving as if the media “was a friend of theirs.”
He shared: “They’d both sued the press in the past over invasions and lies. Pa sued over the so-called Black Spider Letters, his memos to government officials. Willy sued over topless photos of Kate. But both vehemently opposed the idea of Meg and me taking any legal action. Why? I asked. They hummed and hawed. The only answer I could get out of them was that it simply wasn’t advisable. The done thing, etc. I told Meg: You’d think we were suing a dear friend of theirs.”
After fighting it out in court for two years, Meghan Markle eventually won the case against the Mail On Sunday.
This new trial against Associated Newspapers Limited is expected to last four days, and Prince Harry has decided to show up to court every day.
King Charles said he is too busy to see his son. Prince William, Kate Middleton, and their three children have left London to avoid all interactions with Prince Harry.
