Do I even need to waste time telling you that the cause of this new mess for the King is none other than Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex and currently the London legal world’s single biggest source of revenue?
While the King and Queen were enjoying their footman-provided foot rubs and Twiglets on demand at Sandringham, Harry’s lawyers have been back at it, with his third legal action against a UK publisher hitting the courts in less than two months.
First in late March came his case against Associated Newspapers, the publisher of the Daily Mail; then in late April another one against News Group Newspapers (NGN) who put out The Sun and back in the before times, the News of the World; and now this week the Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN).
It has been a bumpy ride for the good ship Buckingham Palace thus far but where things could get decidedly nerve-jangling for His Majesty is that next month the duke will make history, becoming the first senior member of the royal family to take the stand in 130 years.
Harry plus a witness box equals every chance of fireworks bigger and with more of a bang than anything ever set off to mark a Jubilee or the late Queen’s favourite racehorse winning.
In June, Harry is expected to return to the UK and to the High Court to give evidence in the MGN suit, a prospect that should be making Charles as twitchy as when Camilla has her two BFFs over for a gal’s night involving a carton of cigarettes, a crate of Shiraz and live ammunition.
Already this year we have had plenty of embarrassing details come out via the duke’s legal maneuvering including him revealing that his brother Prince William had received a “very large sum” from NGN in 2020 to secretly settle his own claim in relation to phone hacking.
There was also his assertion that there was some sort of secret deal between NGN and the Palace over the hacking too.
NGN’s lawyers told the court that some of the stories about Harry that landed on the Mirror’s front pages could have come from Mark Bolland, then Charles’ Deputy Private Secretary. (Bolland was famously a purveyor of the dark arts when it came to the media and was the spin doctor extraordinaire who masterminded the ascent of Camilla from hated another woman to moderately respected royal doer and occasional sly wink dispenser.)
A father’s most trusted lieutenant ratting out his son to a tabloid? That’s nearly as bad as some tampon-fantasizing.
So, we’ve had rocky shoals aplenty courtesy of Harry’s cases, but, would seem that Harry leaving his family red-faced and seething quietly is something he is as comfortable with as making small talk with the Kardashian-Jenners and pretending to know what this ‘day job’ thing is people talk about.
What that means is that, given this track record on this front, the possibilities of what might come out of Harry’s mouth when he takes the stand are such that Charles might want to think about investing in a crash helmet.
