Prince Harry to make history by giving evidence in court in latest legal battle against the media
By Natalie Oliveri with AP|
T?he Duke of Sussex will tomorrow become the first member of the royal family to give evidence in court in more than 130 years.
Prince Harry will ?take to the witness stand in London's High Court on Tuesday in his latest legal battle against the media.
This time the 38-year-old is suing the Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) who he claims employed illegal tactics to gain information about him, including phone hacking.
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The duke and his legal team will present 33 sample stories published in the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and The People published between 1996 and 2010.
His lawyers say the articles were just some of the 147 they say came about after ?illegal newsgathering.
MGN says that in the vast majority of the sample, it can show the story was legitimately sourced.
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Prince Harry will become the first senior member of the British royal family to give evidence in court since the late 19th century, when Queen Victoria's eldest son, Prince Albert Edward, testified twice in court.?
The man who would go on to become King Edward VII testified in the divorce proceedings of a woman he was accused of having an affair with (he denied it) and in a slander case involving a man who cheated at cards. Edward VII was the great-grandfather of Queen Elizabeth II, Harry's grandmother.
The move will open Prince Harry up to cross examination by some of the UK's top lawyers.?
In a separate legal case, the duke said in court documents that the royal family had assiduously avoided the courts to prevent testifying about matters that might be embarrassing.
The Daily Mirror case is one of three Prince Harry has brought alleging phone hacking and other invasions of his privacy, dating back to when he was a boy.
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In court documents, Prince Harry described his relationship with the press as "uneasy" but it runs much deeper than that. The prince blames paparazzi for causing the car crash that killed his mother, the late Princess Diana.
He also cites harassment and intrusion by the British Press and "vicious, persistent attacks" on his wife, Meghan, including racist articles, as the reason the couple left royal life and fled to the U.S. in 2020.
Reforming the news media has become one of his life's missions.
Harry's lawyer, David Sherborne, said unlawful acts by reporters and editors at the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and Sunday People were "widespread and habitual" and carried out on "an industrial scale." He pointed the finger at management, in particular TV personality Piers Morgan, a former Daily Mirror editor.
Morgan has publicly denied involvement in phone hacking, as has Mirror Group in its court submissions.
Mirror Group lawyer Andrew Green said a substantial proportion of the articles at issue involved a "breathtaking level of triviality" and that with the exception of a few instances of unlawful information gathering, the company's reporters had used public records and sources to legally obtain information.
จC Reported with Associated Press
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