Prince Harry’s Legal Battle: Cost Hearing and Implications

Prince Harry’s legal team is preparing for a crucial court hearing, aiming to reduce the costs he and six other public figures must pay in a lawsuit they lost against the publisher of the Daily Mail. Associated Newspapers Limited plans to recover more than £50 million (approximately $67 million) in legal costs after successfully defending the case at the High Court in London. Harry is not expected to attend personally.

Judge Matthew Nicklin will hear arguments from both parties over two days on July 29 and 30, before determining the costs the claimants will have to pay. Some of the expenses may be covered by insurance. A filing by the newspaper’s legal team, viewed by Newsweek, stated, “The Claimants’ individual cases were pursued for the most part without any supporting documentary evidence and on the barest inferential basis.”

“Allegations of the utmost seriousness were put by the Claimants to Associated’s witnesses without any prior notice or evidential basis,” it continued. “At the same time, other serious allegations—including the most important elements of the allegations of perjury advanced against three of Associated’s senior executives—were either not put to the witnesses at all or only partially put, without at any stage being formally withdrawn.”

This was conducted with absolute privilege and full publicity, courted by and on behalf of the claimants. The other litigants are musician Sir Elton John, his husband David Furnish, actors Elizabeth Hurley and Sadie Frost, racial justice campaigner Baroness Doreen Lawrence, and politician Sir Simon Hughes.

Why It Matters

Harry and the other claimants initiated the lawsuit intending to prove that journalists from the Mail titles broke the law while gathering stories. The prince shared the emotional impact of the intense coverage, which he stated damaged his relationship with ex-girlfriend Chelsy Davy. Despite winning on every allegation, former Mail editor-in-chief Paul Dacre described the case as “a conspiracy” to “destroy” the newspaper group.

Prince Harry’s Case

Filed in 2022, the case included allegations of phone hacking, unlawfully obtaining personal information using private investigators, and other unlawful practices. Over a 10-week trial, Mr Justice Nicklin dismissed all claims, finding that Harry and the other claimants failed to prove the articles and incidents cited were the result of unlawful information gathering.

The judge accepted the explanations given by Mail journalists and rejected the argument that the private information about their lives could have only been acquired illegally. Harry’s case also included allegations that Mail journalists had unlawfully obtained flight records for Chelsy Davy and broken the law to uncover a phone conversation between him and Prince William about photographs published of Princess Diana.

“I do not recall reading this article at the time but it is disgusting, especially with the crude headline and explicit reference to a phone call,” Harry said in a statement seen by Newsweek. “My brother and I were relatively young at the time (I was 21) and we were having private conversations about photographs of our dead mother which had been put into the public domain. It was obviously a ‘highly emotional call’ for William and I as to what we should do.”

The July 2006 story was headlined: “LET HER REST IN PEACE.” Harry suggested the story was obtained by “listening in to calls.” However, Nicklin’s judgment noted “the pleaded case is thin” and “identifies no specific unlawful act,” adding that journalist Rebecca English proposed the “entirely plausible” theory the story originated from a palace press officer.

The judgment marked a significant setback for Harry, who pursued legal action against British newspaper groups for years, citing reforming press practices as his “life’s work.” In a statement after the judgment, Harry and Lawrence called the outcome “a complete and obvious whitewash,” while ANL welcomed it as an “overwhelming victory for the Daily Mail and its journalists, and for a free press generally.”

This story is developing and will receive updates.