Prince Harry highlighted the impact the British press had on his life on his first day giving evidence at the High Court in London as part of his legal case against Mirror Group Newspapers.
Making history as the first senior royal to give evidence in the witness box for 130 years, the Duke of Sussex was cross-examined by Andrew Green, a lawyer for the publishing group, which the royal is suing for damages, claiming journalists at its titles . , which includes The Daily Mirror, The Sunday Mirror and Sunday people, have been linked to methods such as phone hacking, obtaining information by deception, and using private investigators for illegal activities. The lawsuit focuses on 33 stories that were published between 1995 and 2011.
In his witness statement, Prince Harry said the articles he believed to be from hacking were hugely damaging to his relationships.
“I would say their actions have affected every area of my life,” he wrote. “It created a huge amount of paranoia in my relationships. I would immediately become suspicious of anyone who was named in a story about me. I felt like I couldn’t trust anyone, which was a terrible feeling for me, especially at such a young age.”
Harry also took aim at Piers Morgan, who edited the Daily Mirror at the time of the death of his mother, the Princess of Wales, in 1997, recounting an incident in which Morgan wrote that he had “heard rumours” about a meeting between the late. princess and troubled TV star Michael Barrymore.
“The thought that Piers Morgan and his gang of journalists are eavesdropping on my mother’s private and sensitive messages…makes me feel physically ill and even more determined to hold those responsible, including Mr. Morgan, for their despicable and completely unjustified behavior,” said Harry. .
Also in his witness statement, Prince Harry said evidence disclosed by Mirror Group Newspapers in the case revealed that his newspapers made 289 payments to private investigators for information relating to both him and his associates.
“I understood from my lawyers [that these] are huge numbers in the context of this litigation, especially given that the defendant is known to have concealed and destroyed evidence of their wrongdoing on an industrial scale,” he wrote. “Now I realize that my acute paranoia of being constantly under surveillance was not misplaced after all.”
The trial is the first of five pending legal cases the Prince has launched, most of which focus on battles with British tabloids.
In addition to Mirror Group Newspapers, Harry is suing Murdoch’s News Group Newspapers, the publisher Sun.and Associated Newspapers Ltd., which owns Daily mail and Mail on Sunday.
The claims are similar: the journalists and the people they hired listened to phone messages and committed other illegal acts to harass Harry and invade his privacy.
