Prince Harry begins the toughest and most expensive trial of his crusade against the tabloids

LondonPrince Harry faces his third and likely toughest legal battle against the tabloids starting this Monday. The High Court of Justice of England and Wales begins hearings in the civil suit brought by the Duke of Sussex and six others against Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL), publisher of Daily Mail and from Sunday Mail, for allegedly systematic practices of illegally obtaining information.

The lawsuit accuses the group's tabloids of intercepting voicemails, tapping landlines, bribing police officers, fraudulently accessing medical records, and even installing hidden microphones in private homes. The publishing company categorically denies this and calls the accusations "fanciful" and offensive to its journalists.

Next to Enric, from In October 2022, Elton John was added as a litigant. and her husband, David Furnish; actresses Liz Hurley and Sadie Frost Law; and former Secretary of State for Justice Simon Hughes and Baroness Doreen Lawrence, sadly known in the UK for the racist murder of her son, Stephen, in 1993. Paradoxically, the Daily Mail She was key in the media campaign that ultimately led to convictions for that crime. According to her testimony, it was Prince Harry himself who informed her of his suspicions that the newspaper had also spied on her. The trial is expected to last nine weeks, and legal costs are estimated to reach almost 44 million euros.

The trial comes after more than four years of proceedings and a preview that took place between March and April 2023, at the end of which Judge Matthew Nicklin determined that there were sufficient legal grounds to proceed to trial.

Enric's crusade against the tabloids has deep, very personal, and well-known roots. It dates back to the death of his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, while being chased by paparazzi in Paris in 1997and the harassment of his wife, Meghan Markle. In 2021, a London court already convicted him Mail on Sunday for violating his wife's privacy by publishing a letter to her father, Thomas. Furthermore, in the book from Memoirs of the Prince, SpareIn an article published in early 2023, Enrique claimed that his relationship with his father, Charles III, and his brother, Prince William, became strained due to the Royal Household's inability—essentially, he accused them of complicity—to denounce the alleged irregularities of certain media groups.

Precedents don't count for much

In previous cases where Enric has litigated against the media, the 2023 secured a victory against the Mirror groupobtaining £140,600 in compensation for illegal wiretapping. And last year, twenty-four hours before the trial began, he closed one multimillion-dollar deal with the publisher of The Sun and News of the World, owned by the Murdoch group, for privacy violations between 1996 and 2011. The British press reported at the time that Enric received around £9.5 million in compensation.

But these two favorable precedents do not guarantee another victory for the prince. According to experts who, days before the start of the trial, filled the pages of tabloids and even some reputable media outlets with commentary, one of the plaintiffs' weaknesses is the strength of their evidence. Part of the case rests on the investigation by journalist Graham Johnson, a former editor for some of those same tabloids, who was convicted in 2014 for phone hacking. Other initially key witnesses have had their credibility called into question, such as detective Gavin Burrows, who has withdrawn an alleged previous confession, claiming that his signature on it was forged.

Another problem for the litigants is that, unlike other media groups, The Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday They have never been directly involved in the phone hacking scandal or the investigation into illegal payments to public officials from over a decade ago.

In fact, the editor of the Daily Mail For decades, and one of the group's most prominent figures, Paul Dacre, recalled recently that he had already testified in the retired judge's inquest into Leveson regarding the ethical standards of the British press. The proceedings took place in 2012, following the case of The News of the Worldwhich ended with the weekly's closure. Dacre asserted at the time that he conducted an internal investigation and concluded that he was certain there was no possible cause. The plaintiffs, however, will have to convince the judge that circumstantial evidence, patterns of behavior, and payments to intermediaries are sufficient to prove ongoing illegal practices. Associated Newspapers Limited, for its part, may attempt a technical defense based on the statute of limitations, since civil lawsuits have a six-year time limit for filing. However, the plaintiffs maintain that it only became aware of the facts recently (2022). Enric is scheduled to testify in person on Thursday. But no one can guarantee that the parties will reach an out-of-court settlement minutes before the hearing begins. Because whoever loses will have to cover the enormous legal costs of this new battle, which, in short, pits the British royal family against the tabloids—a class-based ecosystem that has mutually benefited for decades from a relationship designed to entertain the public and help maintain the status quo.