A shorter day, but plenty of punches thrown by claimants and defencepublished at 15:59 GMT
15:59 GMT
Imogen James
Reporting from the High Court
The second day of Prince Harry’s trial against the publishers of the Daily Mail ended a lot sooner than we anticipated.
It has thrown a bit of a spanner in the works for the rest of the week’s proceedings with the timetable now needing to adjust, but here’s a recap of the day:
The claimants
Barrister David Sherborne went through the claims of the Duke of Sussex, Sir Elton John, David Furnish, Elizabeth Hurley and Sir Simon Hughes.
Sherborne said nobody sold more papers than Prince Harry for the Daily Mail, and accused multiple journalists of using private investigators to gain information unlawfully. In his witness statement the Duke of Sussex spoke of the impact this has had; the “distress, paranoia” and the “other feelings it generated”.
As for Elizabeth Hurley, Sherborne accused Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) of obtaining information about her pregnancy and the paternity of her son Damian, who sat next to her in court today. There are a “number of chunky payments” made to private investigating firm ELI from a Daily Mail journalist at this time, Sherborne alleged.
Sir Elton John and his husband David Furnish claimed the Daily Mail obtained the birth certificate for their son before they did, Sherborne said.
And the barrister said the Mail was also “prepared to exploit” Sir Simon Hughes’ sexuality.
Closing his argument, Sherborne said the claimants are not there for compensation but to “uncover the truth” about what happened to them.
The defence
Antony White KC said that the claimants were “clutching at straws” in their case, and that Sherborne had not provided evidence of what the private investigators were doing for the money they received from the Mail.
In many of the cases he told the court that information in stories said to have been obtained unlawfully had actually been published previously.
He also said that friends and social circles contributed as sources to the journalists.
He then wrapped his opening argument, and said he kept it short for the benefit of the trial.
Our live coverage is pausing now, but we’ll be back when Prince Harry has his day in court. Thanks for joining.