{"id":30288,"date":"2026-01-19T19:48:37","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T00:48:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/?p=30288"},"modified":"2026-01-19T19:48:37","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T00:48:37","slug":"trial-begins-of-prince-harry-and-the-other-high-profile-co-claimants-against-associated-newspapers-anl-alleging-stories-about-them-published-using-information-illegally-obtained","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2026\/01\/19\/trial-begins-of-prince-harry-and-the-other-high-profile-co-claimants-against-associated-newspapers-anl-alleging-stories-about-them-published-using-information-illegally-obtained\/","title":{"rendered":"Trial begins of Prince Harry and the other high-profile co-claimants against Associated Newspapers (ANL) alleging stories about them published using information illegally obtained"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"ssrcss-suhx0k-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0\" data-component=\"text-block\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1o5p6v2-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\"><b class=\"ssrcss-1xjjfut-BoldText e5tfeyi3\">The Duke of Sussex was made to feel &#8220;paranoid beyond belief&#8221; by alleged unlawful information gathering by the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday, a court has heard.<\/b><\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Prince Harry is among seven high-profile claimants including Sir Elton John and Liz Hurley alleging the papers&#8217; publisher, Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL), committed &#8220;grave breaches of privacy&#8221; over a 20-year period.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The prince felt his &#8220;every move, thought or feeling was being tracked and monitored just for the Mail to make money out of it&#8221;, according to a written submission by his lawyer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">ANL said the duke&#8217;s social circle was &#8220;known to be a good source of leaks&#8221; to the press and has repeatedly denied the claimants&#8217; allegations.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-suhx0k-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0\" data-component=\"text-block\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1o5p6v2-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Antony White KC, representing the publisher, said it was &#8220;a striking feature of the case that none of the articles were the subject of complaint by the claimants at the time of publication&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;The pattern of misconduct the claimants seek to establish is simply not made out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Joining the duke in bringing the lawsuit against ANL are:<\/p>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-h5qd1q-ListContainer e5tfeyi0\">\n<ul role=\"list\">\n<li>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Actors Liz Hurley and Sadie Frost<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sir Elton John and his husband David Furnish<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sir Simon Hughes, the former Liberal Democrat MP<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Baroness Doreen Lawrence, a campaigner whose son Stephen Lawrence was murdered in a racist attack in south London in 1993<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-suhx0k-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0\" data-component=\"text-block\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1o5p6v2-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Prince Harry was present in the courtroom on Monday for the first day of the trial, which is expected to last nine weeks.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">David Sherborne, representing the claimants, quoted the prince in his written submission as saying the papers&#8217; alleged activity created &#8220;distrust and suspicion&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He said the &#8220;intrusion&#8221; was &#8220;terrifying&#8221; for his loved ones while &#8220;isolating me&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sherborne said the alleged unlawful information gathering in the duke&#8217;s case was related to 14 articles between 2001 and 2013.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The Daily Mail&#8217;s current royal editor Rebecca English was accused of &#8220;obtaining the exact plane seats, flight times and travel plans&#8221; of Prince Harry&#8217;s then-girlfriend Chelsy Davy in December 2007.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sherborne alleged the information was obtained through private investigator Mike Behr, who was accused of suggesting he could &#8220;plant someone next to her&#8221; on the flight to South Africa.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">For the publisher, White said English &#8220;strongly denies that she ever used Mr Behr for unlawful information-gathering&#8221;, and the allegation was &#8220;unsupported by the evidence before the court&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He said the prince&#8217;s social circle &#8220;at all material times\u2026 was and was known to be a good source of leaks or disclosure of information to the media about what he got up to in his private life.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He said all the articles &#8220;were sourced entirely legitimately from information variously provided by contacts of the journalists responsible&#8221;, including press officers and publicists, freelance journalists, photographers and prior reports.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">White also said the duke discussed his private life in the media and that information about his life was provided by Palace spokespeople.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-bq6git-ComponentWrapper ep2nwvo2\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1j1rzn0-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<ul class=\"ssrcss-1q9m0bv-Stack e1y4nx260\" role=\"list\">\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1j1rzn0-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1ww1l1o-LinkHeadline e3eyuya4\"><span aria-hidden=\"false\">Harry&#8217;s war with the press is back in court. But this time it&#8217;s different<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1ulytiq-LinkIconContainer e3eyuya3\"><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-13nu8ri-GroupChildrenForWrapping eh44mf02\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-1dqo2s-MetadataStripItem eh44mf01\" role=\"listitem\">\n<div class=\"visually-hidden ssrcss-1f39n02-VisuallyHidden e16en2lz0\">Published<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-m5j4pi-MetadataContent eh44mf00\"><span class=\"ssrcss-1pvwv4b-MetadataSnippet e4wm5bw3\"><span class=\"ssrcss-61mhsj-MetadataText e4wm5bw1\">1 day ago<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1j1rzn0-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-13nu8ri-GroupChildrenForWrapping eh44mf02\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1j1rzn0-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1ww1l1o-LinkHeadline e3eyuya4\"><span aria-hidden=\"false\">Prince Harry to appear in court in legal action against Daily Mail publishers<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1ulytiq-LinkIconContainer e3eyuya3\"><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-13nu8ri-GroupChildrenForWrapping eh44mf02\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-1dqo2s-MetadataStripItem eh44mf01\" role=\"listitem\">\n<div class=\"visually-hidden ssrcss-1f39n02-VisuallyHidden e16en2lz0\">Published<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-m5j4pi-MetadataContent eh44mf00\"><span class=\"ssrcss-1pvwv4b-MetadataSnippet e4wm5bw3\"><span class=\"ssrcss-61mhsj-MetadataText e4wm5bw1\">23 hours ago<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1j1rzn0-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-13nu8ri-GroupChildrenForWrapping eh44mf02\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1j1rzn0-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1ww1l1o-LinkHeadline e3eyuya4\"><span aria-hidden=\"false\">Why did Harry and Meghan leave the Royal family?<\/span><\/p>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1ulytiq-LinkIconContainer e3eyuya3\"><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-13nu8ri-GroupChildrenForWrapping eh44mf02\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-1dqo2s-MetadataStripItem eh44mf01\" role=\"listitem\">\n<div class=\"visually-hidden ssrcss-1f39n02-VisuallyHidden e16en2lz0\">Published<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-m5j4pi-MetadataContent eh44mf00\"><span class=\"ssrcss-1pvwv4b-MetadataSnippet e4wm5bw3\"><span class=\"ssrcss-61mhsj-MetadataText e4wm5bw1\">12 hours ago<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ssrcss-qzx51b-LinkItem e3eyuya1\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1j1rzn0-Stack e1y4nx260\">\n<div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-13nu8ri-GroupChildrenForWrapping eh44mf02\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"ssrcss-suhx0k-RichTextComponentWrapper ep2nwvo0\" data-component=\"text-block\">\n<div class=\"ssrcss-1o5p6v2-RichTextContainer e5tfeyi1\">\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sherborne said there had been &#8220;systematic and sustained use of unlawful information gathering&#8221; at the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday and that there was &#8220;no way&#8221; that details reported in some articles could have been lawfully obtained.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In their joint opening statement, the claimants accused a string of senior Mail and Mail on Sunday journalists of commissioning and using unlawfully gathered information from private investigators.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">They said they were &#8220;engaged in or complicit in the culture of unlawful information gathering that wrecked the lives of so many&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sir Elton and Furnish accused ANL of &#8220;stealing&#8221; their son Zachary&#8217;s birth certificate before they &#8220;had a chance to see it ourselves,&#8221; accusing the publisher of &#8220;invasion of medical details&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">White said in written submissions that their claims were &#8220;unsupported by any evidence before the court and utterly baseless&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Mail on Sunday journalist Katie Nicholl was accused of having obtained intimate information about Frost&#8217;s private life &#8211; including the termination of her pregnancy, about which the actor had not even told her mother.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Notebooks showed &#8220;Susie&#8221; of ELI, a private investigation firm, provided information on the point, Sherborne said, adding that days later there were payments recorded as &#8220;KATIE NICHOLLS URGENT ENQ&#8221; and &#8220;K NICHOLLS SEARCHES&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Baroness Lawrence said she felt she had been targeted as she sought the truth about her son&#8217;s murder.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">She said she felt she &#8220;could not even grieve the injustice of what was happening privately, even for a day&#8221; and that she had been made &#8220;a victim all over again&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Her allegations concern five articles published between 1997 and 2007, written by veteran Daily Mail crime correspondent Stephen Wright.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The claims include that he made payments of thousands in cash for &#8220;special contacts re Stephen Lawrence&#8221; and &#8220;special inquiries&#8221;, and that he got &#8220;well-known blagger&#8221; Christine Hart to call Baroness Lawrence pretending to be a journalist from the Guardian, as it was believed she would be more likely to speak to her.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Baroness Lawrence said she was &#8220;angry that the Mail seem more interested in interrogating me about how I found out what they did to me&#8230; then threatening to question me at trial about all this, rather than saying sorry, investigating what it did, and getting at the truth of what happened&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">White said the allegations against the reporter were &#8220;denied in their entirety&#8221; and were &#8220;unsupported by the available evidence&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sherborne meanwhile said ANL had kept up a &#8220;hear-no-evil, see-no-evil, speak-no-evil defence&#8221;, claiming that during the 2012 Leveson public inquiry &#8211; into the culture, practice and ethics of the press &#8211; the publisher argued there had been no unlawful activity at all.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">He said ANL &#8220;knew they had skeletons in their closet&#8221; because the company investigated the use of phone hacking between 2003-05, finding evidence in stories that the technique had been used.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">ANL has repeatedly denied the allegations, calling them &#8220;lurid&#8221; and &#8220;preposterous&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">White said: &#8220;In relation to almost every article alleged to be the product of phone hacking or phone tapping Associated is able to call a witness or witnesses to explain how the article was in fact sourced.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The lawyer added that &#8220;the pattern of misconduct the claimants seek to establish is simply not made out.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">This is a civil trial, so there is no jury. The judge Mr Justice Nicklin will decide the case on his own.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">It is Prince Harry&#8217;s third major court battle accusing newspaper groups of unlawful behaviour.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In December 2023, he won 15 claims in his case accusing Mirror Group Newspapers of unlawfully gathering information for stories published about him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In January 2025, the publisher of the Sun newspaper agreed to pay &#8220;substantial damages&#8221; and issued an apology to the prince, over claims of unlawful intrusion into his life.<\/p>\n<p>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/c5yvl7vy2ylo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">bbc.co.uk<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\">The Duke of Sussex was made to feel &#8220;paranoid beyond belief&#8221; by alleged unlawful information gathering by the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday, a court has heard. Prince Harry is among seven high-profile <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/2026\/01\/19\/trial-begins-of-prince-harry-and-the-other-high-profile-co-claimants-against-associated-newspapers-anl-alleging-stories-about-them-published-using-information-illegally-obtained\/\" title=\"Trial begins of Prince Harry and the other high-profile co-claimants against Associated Newspapers (ANL) alleging stories about them published using information illegally obtained\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30289,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[109,2,4],"tags":[9300,620,6637,7146,6638,5750],"class_list":{"0":"post-30288","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headline","8":"category-news","9":"category-uk","10":"tag-associated-newspapers-ltd","11":"tag-daily-mail","12":"tag-duke-of-sussex","13":"tag-mail-on-sunday","14":"tag-prince-harry","15":"tag-royal-courts-of-justice","16":"pmpro-has-access"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30288","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30288"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30288\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30290,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30288\/revisions\/30290"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30288"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30288"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worldjusticenews.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30288"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}