Prince Harry has lost his long-running lawsuit against the publishers of the Daily Mail.
The British royal, who now lives in Montecito, California, was among a group of high-profile figures who filed suit in 2022 alleging they were victims of unlawful information gathering.
The others were Elton John, David Furnish, actors Elizabeth Hurley and Sadie Frost, campaigner Doreen Lawrence and former politician Sir Simon Hughes. The court said all the claimants had failed to prove their claims.
The group alleged that as well as hacking their phones, journalists from the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday tapped landlines and bugged houses and cars. Publisher Associated Newspapers had strenuously denied the claims.
A hearing to determine costs will be held at a late date.
Judge Nicklin noted in his judgment the claimants are “open to criticism” for the way in which some of their case was put forward, specifically an allegation that Associated employees had lied during the Leveson Inquiry, the U.K.’s judge-led review of the British press’ culture and practices.
“The allegations were extremely serious. Yet… they were not consistently anchored to identified statements which were put to the relevant witness as deliberate falsehoods,” Judge Nicklin wrote. “In significant respects the case shifted from the pleaded allegation of lies to broader criticisms of Associated’s inquiries, disclosure and corporate response to the Leveson Inquiry. This is not how allegations of this seriousness should be advanced.”
He also evaluated Harry as a witness more generally, saying: “In assessing Prince Harry’s evidence overall, it was apparent that he wished the Court to understand the personal impact of the matters in issue. At times, this led him beyond giving factual evidence into advancing arguments on the issues…Overall, this did not affect the quality of Prince Harry’s evidence, which I accept. As with each of the Claimants, Prince Harry has limited evidence to give on the contentious matters in dispute.”
An 11-week trial took place earlier this year, with costs estimated to be in the region of $40 million.
Coincidentally, Harry is in the U.K. this week for the one-year countdown to the next Invictus Games, the sports tournament he created for injured veterans, which is set to take place in Birmingham in July 2027.
The case is the latest in Harry’s long-running crusade against the press. He previously sued Mirror Group Newspapers for unlawful information gathering, winning a partial victory before settling, and News Group Newspapers over the same issue, which settled out of court. In 2022, Harry also sued Associated Newspapers for libel over an article concerning his lawsuit against the government. He eventually withdrew the libel claim against Associated and lost the claim against the government, which concerned his security arrangements.
In a statement, a spokesperson for Associated said: “This is a magnificent vindication of the Daily Mail’s journalism. The reputations of our decent and hard-working journalists were terribly impugned, and today they have been exonerated. As the judgment clearly shows, every single article was legitimately sourced. We will look to resolve outstanding issues, including the recovery of the costs we have incurred while defending ourselves against this egregious litigation.”
Even after today’s judgment, Harry’s legal woes are not quite done. In March, the prince was sued by Sentebale, the charity he founded, for defamation, after a public falling out with the charity’s chair Sophie Chandauka.