Up to £38m legal costs, 4-year wait and 14 news articles: Harry’s court battle with Daily Mail publisher in numbers

Prince Harry and six others lost their high-profile lawsuit against the book’s publisher. Daily Mail.

During an 11-week trial, the group, including Sir Elton John and Baroness Doreen Lawrence, alleged unlawful collection of information by Asscoiated Newspaper Limited (ANL), from tapping landlines to obtaining information by deception, which they said left them feeling “breached”, “deep betrayal” and “shock and horror”.

However, on Tuesday, their claims, which were vehemently denied by ANL, were dismissed by a Supreme Court order.

In a 436-page written decision, Mr Justice Nicklin said he accepted the limited evidence given by the Duke of Sussex at the hearing in January. But it ruled that neither Harry nor the other plaintiffs had proven their allegations of unlawful collection of information.

ANL described the dismissal of all 97 claims made by the plaintiffs as “a magnificent testament to Daily Mail journalism”.

Here, Independent If we look at the case with numbers:

436-page written decision

In his judgment on Tuesday, Mr Justice Nicklin dismissed all the allegations, ruling that none of the group of seven had proven their allegations of unlawful collection of information.

The ruling said it was clear in Harry’s testimony in January that he “wanted the court to understand the personal impact of the issues at stake”.

The judge then said it was up to the plaintiffs’ group to prove their allegations of unlawful collection of information.

He said: “Although the standard of proof remains the balance of probabilities, the more serious and inherently less likely the allegation, the more convincing the evidence required to prove it.”

Mr Justice Nicklin then added: “In fact, the plaintiffs’ case invites the court to conclude that because the information is private and linked: [ANL] If it cannot explain positively how it was sourced, the article must have been sourced unlawfully.

“This is not an acceptable approach”

Four years, 45 days trial period: Wait for the decision after the claim papers are first served

October 2022 was the date when the claim form was first submitted by the seven claimants against ANL; Almost four years later, the trial began at the Royal Courts of Justice on 19 January. It lasted 45 days until March 31, when all parties’ closing arguments were completed.

The decision came on July 7 this year, 1,370 days after the claim forms were first submitted on October 6.

Seven plaintiffs: Harry among household names in class claim

During an 11-week trial, the High Court in London heard the group’s allegations of illegal information collection against ANL. The rest of the group includes Sir Elton’s husband David Furnish, Liz Hurley, Sadie Frost and Sir Simon Hughes.

Lady Lawrence claimed Daily Mail He was pretending to support justice for his son, Stephen Lawrence, who was killed in a racist attack in 1993. His lawyers claim he was “extensively targeted” by private detectives to obtain information, including bribe payments to police.

Sir Elton and Mr Furnish claimed 10 articles about them were based on illegal information gathering, including illegally obtained medical information and tapping landlines. The couple claimed that their son Zachary’s birth certificate was stolen without a copy being obtained.

Ms Frost claimed the information behind some of the articles about her was “hacked from my voicemails” because it was “verbatim” from her messages.

Miss Hurley blamed Daily Mail The publisher who stole her medical records while she was pregnant with her son.

ANL denied the allegations.

14 articles: Harry’s trial was based on stories published between 2001 and 2013

The Duke of Sussex claimed 14 articles published by ANL were based on illegal information gathering. His lawyers said the stories were written between 2001 and 2013 and “focused primarily, in a highly intrusive and damaging way, on the relationships he had established, or rather sought to establish, in the years before he met his current wife, Meghan, Duchess of Sussex.”

The articles also included a piece about her former nanny Tiggy Legge-Bourke’s decision to choose the Duke of Sussex as her child’s godfather. According to written statements by attorney David Sherborne, only three people were aware of the decision before the article was written. mail on sunday Journalist Katie Nicholl has no knowledge of anyone in the extended family, including the current King. Mr Sherborne said there was “no reasonably legitimate source for the information”. ANL said the article was “obtained entirely from legal sources”.

Another story concerned Harry’s reported affair with TV presenter Natalie Pinkham. Mr Sherborne said the information passed on by Ms Nicholl was known only to her “close circle of friends” and it was “not credible” that she had received it from a club promoter or freelance journalist. ANL said the journalist “had various sources at the time who knew both Ms Pinkham and the Duke of Sussex well”.

One of the stories was about Harry’s relationship with his first serious girlfriend, Laura Gerard-Leigh, and their “intentions and habits as a couple”. Harry claimed it was “extraordinary” that the information had made it to the press due to “the secrecy it entailed and the ‘small’ circle of friends who knew about it”. ANL said the story, written by Ms Nicholl and freelance journalist Andy Buckwell, was based partly on photographs of the couple with friends at the Badminton Horse Trials.

Two hours: Harry faces questions in court

There was laughter in the courtroom when the Duke of Sussex took the witness stand and admitted he couldn’t remember how he was referred to when he last appeared in court – but by the end of the session, Harry was close to tears.

Answering questions from barrister David Sherborne on behalf of the group suing ANL, Harry said: “They continue to come after me, they have made my wife’s life a complete misery, my Lord.”

Wearing a dark suit and striped tie, Harry spent nearly two hours in the witness box, swearing on the Bible, before giving evidence. Taking notes and asking for hard copies of news articles that he was being questioned about, he said he did not have “leaky” social circles.

“When you encounter such a situation and something special emerges, your circle of trust and knowledge decreases over time.” He added: “The things described in these articles are not the kind of things I would talk about openly.”

Harry also claimed he was “forced” to work with reporters and said it was “beyond cruel” to publish an article about his “secret discussions” after a photo of the dying Diana was published in the Italian press.

In his written statement, Harry described an article published in the magazine. Daily Mail In July 2006, he described private conversations with his brother, now the Prince of Wales, as “truly disgusting”.

He said in the witness box: “The amount of information and detail in this article would not have come from Clarence House; they were clearly wiretapping calls and spending large sums of money on private detectives.”

ANL vehemently denied wrongdoing and defended the allegations.

40 journalists: Members of the press who participated in the case on behalf of ANL

More than 40 witnesses attended the hearing on behalf of ANL. Daily Mail In his written statement, editor Paul Dacre said it was “inconceivable” that anyone at the paper could have carried out the alleged activities.

He later said the allegations had had a “deeply distressing” and sometimes “traumatic” impact on staff at the newspaper, adding: “I have witnessed the suffering of honest, dedicated journalists who have had an insidious dark shadow hanging over their lives for three years.”

The ANL said the allegation was devised by press reform campaign group Hacked Off as part of a “political campaign to show that the ANL misled the Leveson Inquiry to pressure the government to implement the second part of the inquiry”. Mr Dacre told the court he “absolutely” denied the allegation that he had lied to the investigation into press standards.

In a statement following Tuesday’s ruling, ANL said: “His Honor Judge Nicklin today cleared the Daily Mail and The Mail On Sunday and dismissed each of the 97 claims made by the plaintiffs.

“In each case, the judge accepted the honesty of our journalists’ statements about how they sourced their stories.”

Up to £38 million: Cost of legal battle

The case was extremely expensive.

Prior to the hearing, all parties submitted their budgets to the court, with the plaintiffs’ total budget coming to £18.7 million. ANL’s budget stood at £19.9 million.

In a judgment issued following last year’s costs management hearing, Mr Justice Nicklin and Mr Justice David Cook concluded that the sums were “manifestly excessive and therefore disproportionate”, allowing a total of £4.1 million for the claimants and £4.4 million for ANL.

The actual budget may be higher, but judges’ limits will likely reflect any reimbursements that may be awarded to cover costs.