Prince Harry Reveals All in ITV Doc on Tabloid Lawsuits, Saying U.K. Press Is “Why I Won’t Bring Meghan Back”

Lily Ford
·5 min read
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Prince Harry has given his first interview since his privacy lawsuit win against a major U.K. tabloid, speaking at length about the ongoing legal battle and why the late Queen Elizabeth II is “very much up there saying, ‘See this through to the end.'”

In ITV’s deep-dive documentary Tabloids on Trial, which aired in the U.K. on Thursday night, the Duke of Sussex was among myriad names, including Hugh Grant, former England soccer star Paul Gascoigne and ex-Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who opened up about their fight for justice in the extensive phone-hacking scandal and subsequent legal battles.

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The prince alleges that he was targeted by journalists and private investigators working for Rupert Murdoch’s News Group Newspapers (NGN) titles The Sun and the now-defunct News of the World, which closed in 2011. Grant was also among those involved in the NGN lawsuits (the Briton settled the illegal snooping case last month after steep legal costs forced his hand, he revealed in the doc). NGN has denied any illegal wrongdoing ever took place.

In December, London judge Justice Timothy Fancourt ruled in Harry’s favor in a 386-page decision handed down in the High Court; he said that phone hacking, which for the prince dated back to 2003, was “widespread and habitual” at Mirror Group Newspapers — and that executives there had covered it up. Harry, who is breaking with royal tradition in this fight, becoming the first in the family to testify in open court in over a century, also has a pending case against British red top The Daily Mail.

“I’m trying to get justice for everybody,” Harry told ITV journalist Rebecca Barry. “This is a David versus Goliath situation — the Davids are the claimants, and the Goliath is this vast media enterprise.” When asked about his December 2023 win against MGN, he said: “I did feel vindicated. Phone hacking has been going on for a long time … There’s a huge amount that has come to light now that people and the British public, specifically, had no idea about.”

Harry alleges that his voicemails were intercepted and flight records blagged — a term meaning information was obtained dishonestly — among other enormous invasions of his privacy. “It felt like harassment,” he said of being mobbed by paparazzi. “It felt horrible then. It feels horrible now.”

The prince also discussed how taking these tabloids to court has caused a “rift” between him and his family, but he said he sees the fight as necessary for his wife, Meghan Markle, and their children. “It is clear now to everybody that the risk of taking on the press and the risk of such retaliation from them of taking these claims forward. It’s clearly not in [the royal family’s] interest to do that. It’s clear from the last four years with my wife, my children … They pushed me too far, [and] it got to a point where you’re damned if you do, and you’re damned if you don’t.

“There’s no one better placed to see this thing through than myself,” he continued, before discussing the danger the tabloid press poses to his family’s safety. “It’s one of the reasons why I won’t bring my wife back to this country.” Barry then asked him if his “granny” — Queen Elizabeth II — would be supportive of the legal action. “We had many conversations before she passed. This is very much something she supported. She knew how much this meant to me,” he recalled. “She’s very much up there saying, ‘See this through to the end,’ without question.”

The prince also said it “would be nice” if he had the support of his family, though he is doing it for “my reasons.” He added, “Anything I say about my family results in a torrent of abuse from the press. I’ve made it clear that this is something that needs to be done.” He voiced fears that his mother, Princess Diana, was an early victim of phone hacking.

Grant told Barry his flat was burgled, microphones were put in his window boxes and dropped into his car, and medical records of him and the mothers of his children were stolen from NHS databases. “These people live above the law and the police. In that day, [they] were as dangerous as the reporters because the [Metropolitan Police] just got straight on the phone to the tabloids and tipped them off.”

Grant settled out of court, which he believes implies guilt: “If you’re innocent, why do you shove so much money at someone so you don’t have to go to court?” he said. But he purports that settling was the only way forward because if he went to court and won, “even one penny less” offered in damages meant he would have to cover both sides’ costs. “And that would have been about 10 million quid.”

The doc covered the 2012 Leveson Inquiry, a judicial public inquiry into the phone-hacking scandal that saw Murdoch himself and ex-editor of News of the World Piers Morgan sworn in and grilled. But Barry reported the tabloids often chalked much of the wrongdoing to “rogue” reporters and denied the practice was widespread. However, an ex-reporter for one of the papers told the ITV journalist that phone hacking was “almost an industry-standard technique.” He gave one example where the reporters pretended to be members of Bob Geldof’s team to get a bill from a French hotel. They called all the numbers on it, he said, to work out who Geldof’s new girlfriend was.

The documentary also covers accusations of a cover-up, including that thousands of emails before 2004 were deleted from NGN servers. The company maintains that this was a “long-scheduled” clear-out of their systems and no cover-up took place. Prince Harry hopes his trial will begin as early as next year.

While NGN has continued to refute unlawful activity occurred, a spokesperson for MGN said when the prince won his claims against the group: “We are pleased to have reached this agreement, which gives our business further clarity to move forward from events that took place many years ago and for which we have apologized.”

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