Prince Harry reappeared at London’s High Court on Thursday for the final day of a four-day hearing in his latest legal battle.
He is one of several high-profile individuals bringing privacy claims against ANL, the publisher of the Daily Mail, over allegations it carried out or commissioned illegal or unlawful information-gathering.
Harry sat through all of the proceedings on both Monday and Tuesday – you can see his arrival on day two below – but was absent from Wednesday’s sitting.
ANL, which denies the allegations, says a judge should rule in its favour without a trial because the legal challenges against it are brought “far too late”.
David Sherborne, representing Harry and others, said ANL’s challenge to their legal action was “ambitious as it is unattractive”.
He accused the publisher of seeking an “impermissible mini-trial or worse” before further documentation and evidence was secured in the cases.
The barrister said the group, which also includes actresses Sadie Frost and Liz Hurley and ex-Liberal Democrat MP Sir Simon Hughes, had a “compelling case”.
Harry has joined forces with the likes of Sir Elton John and David Furnish, Baroness Doreen Lawrence of Clarendon and Sadie Frost to bring privacy claims against the publisher over allegations it carried out or commissioned illegal or unlawful information-gathering.
This included the hiring of private investigators to place listening devices inside cars, the ‘blagging’ of private records and the accessing and recording of private phone conversations.
In a document filed on Harry’s behalf, barrister David Sherborne revealed the impact such “unlawful acts” had on his teenage years.
It read, in part: “In particular, suspicion and paranoia were caused by Associated’s publication of the unlawful articles: friends were lost or cut off as a result and everyone became a ‘suspect’ since he was misled by the way that the articles were written into believing that those close to him were the source of this information being provided to Associated’s newspapers.”
He added: “The claimant regards Associated’s unlawful acts to amount to a major betrayal given promises made by the media to improve its conduct following the tragic and untimely death of his mother, Princess Diana, in 1997.”
