Tuesday Trial: Prince Harry v MGN

My four day case having gone short, I had a free morning. So, I dropped by Justice Fancourt’s court  to watch an hour or so, of the case Prince Harry is running against Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN). 

He alleges that journalists gathered information about him unlawfully, including using phone hacking ie listening to his voicemails and used that information in articles they then wrote about him. The 33 sample articles date back many years and largely centre around his relationship with his then girlfriend Chelsy Davy but also cover his time in the army and involvement with other women.

Outside court

Outside court, there was a large media presence and a small group of mostly tourists waiting around, drinking early morning coffees and taking selfies. 

Upstairs, outside the courtroom, there were more journalists, court staff and three Harry supporters. The case was split between two courts, the main court room and an overspill court where there was a video link of the day’s proceedings. 

Shortly before the 10.30am start, Harry suddenly walked past, heading for the conference room where he would stay until called by the court. Being in the middle of his oral evidence, he was not permitted to speak to his legal team.

In person he is thin and very pale. He seemed in good spirits and smiled at the three supporters, one of whom shouted ‘we love you Harry’ as he went by.

The hearing

Andrew Green KC continued the cross-examination he had begun yesterday. 

There were no particular fireworks in the section I observed. Andrew Green KC was thorough and methodical in his approach, clearly well versed in his brief. He calmly and carefully went through a series of old newspaper articles trying to establish the basis for Harry‘s claim that the information in these articles had been obtained unlawfully, in particular by phone hacking. 

In turn, Harry, too, was mostly subdued in his responses. Much of what he said was repetitive.

In the hour that I observed, Harry did not provide any concrete examples of knowing that the information in the articles had been unlawfully obtained. For example, he was asked a few times whose phone might have been hacked to get a certain piece of information. There was no clear answer.

He repeatedly used the word ‘suspicious’, as in ‘it was suspicious, ‘ it was highly suspicious,’ to describe how journalists had come to know certain information about him.

On behalf of MGN, Andrew Green KC referred him to other newspaper articles and news agencies which had run a particular story before The Mirror, suggesting that the information was, therefore,already public knowledge.

Apart from ‘suspicious’, Harry also often used the words “I believe.” As in I now believe it must have happened via phone hacking. 

He believes that journalists were asked by their editors to get more details on stories about him.

Another often repeated word was ‘distressing.’ Reading the articles, with his legal team, he said, was distressing for him. One article saying that he had been dumped by Chelsy Davy, was ‘very hurtful’. Later he said that an article was distressing for him and for Miss Davy who now had her own family. Several times he referred to Chelsy as ‘my girlfriend.’

In respect of each article he was asked by the KC when he had first seen it. His most common answer was “I can’t remember when I first saw it.”

At one point, after his suggestion that it was highly suspicious how a story had been obtained, Andrew Green KC put it to him that “we are now in the land of total speculation.”

At another point the KC mildly rebuked him for asking a question saying that it was not his position to ask questions of the barrister. But overall, the cross-examination though thorough was not aggressive.

He made several references to his legal team and The palace.  The latter, he said had handled  previous Royal concerns about the press and the former had all the information about this case, including whether he had any call data to support his claim of hacking.

He was asked about the police investigations of the now defunct News of the World newspaper, the arrest of those linked with that particular case and their subsequent convictions. He was vague in his recollections of the case but said he had some knowledge of it. 

It was put to him that once people went to prison for phone hacking, other journalists would surely be more careful about the methods they used. He disagreed saying, no I don’t believe that. He suggested that the rewards were so great that it wouldn’t put people off.

In one exchange Andrew Green KC asked him, ‘if the court found you were not hacked would you be disappointed or relieved?’

He replied that he believed phone hacking had been happening on an industrial scale, a term he used often. So, he would feel an injustice if the claim was not accepted.

So you want your phone to have been hacked, suggested Green.

No one wants it, replied Harry.

When asked whether he had sued other newspapers for phone hacking/obtaining information unlawfully, he replied that he didn’t believe it was happening on such an ‘industrial scale’ at other papers.

He added “and I’m quite busy with other litigation,” which caused some amusement.

He was asked if there had been a specific article that had led him to speak to lawyers in the years these articles were being published.  He said this claim began when he bumped into his current counsel, in France, in 2018. By this point, he said, it was about putting together a way to stop the abuse against his wife and him. 

It was put to him he appeared to be saying that between 1996–2010 his phone had been hacked, perhaps daily? He replied that could be the case but he wouldn’t know.

Do you have any evidence of it, asked Andrew Green KC.

That’s why I’m here, replied Harry.

As an aside, it was noticeable how Harry pronounced words like litigation and security as the Americanised lidigation and securidy and how he dropped his Ts in other words too.

I didn’t see the end of Harry’s evidence as I left during a break and I haven’t followed the case generally. As such I have no view as to the merits or otherwise of the claim. But it is ironic that he is having to relive his love affair with Chelsy Davy in litigation which was supposedly started to protect his current relationship.