LONDON (AP) – Prince Harry issued an unprecedented apology Wednesday for the years-long intrusion into his life by Rupert Murdoch’s British tabloids, offering a hefty sum to settle a privacy violation lawsuit. It agreed to pay damages and claimed a “monumental” victory.
News Group Newspapers has confirmed that private investigators and journalists targeted Harry with phone hacking, surveillance and misuse of his personal information. The company offered him a “full and unequivocal apology” for invading the now-defunct News of the World and its sister tabloid The Sun.
The statement, read out by Prince Harry’s lawyer David Sherborne at the High Court in London, went beyond the scope of the lawsuit to highlight the intervention in the life of Prince Harry’s mother, the late Princess Diana, and the impact it had on the family. admitted.
“We acknowledge and apologize for the pain we have caused the Duke and the damage we have caused to his relationships, friendships and family, and we have agreed to pay significant compensation,” the settlement statement said.
His cell phone was hacked and monitored.
News Group has long acknowledged that Mr Murdoch’s mobile phone was hacked by staff at his weekly newspaper, News of the World, which closed in 2011 amid a public backlash against tabloid prying eyes. Ta. However, this is the first time the company has admitted wrongdoing at the Sun. The Sun was a newspaper that once sold millions of copies and focused on sports, celebrities and sex (including a topless woman on the third page).
Prince Harry, 40, the second son of Charles III, had vowed to publicly expose the Sun newspaper’s wrongdoing and to go to court to win a court ruling in his favor. He and former Labor MP Tom Watson are the only two remaining of more than 1,300 other claimants who have settled their case against News Group Newspapers.
The trial was scheduled to begin on Tuesday but was postponed amid last-minute negotiations that led to the dramatic settlement announcement.
The settlement means that Prince Harry will not have his day in court, but his lawyers believe that the settlement will ensure that Prince Harry himself and his family were not exposed to the wiretapping of his voicemails, wiretapping of his phone calls, wiretapping of his car, and various forms of deception. He said the responsibility he had asked of hundreds of others had been fulfilled.
News Group admitted to “phone hacking, surveillance and misuse of private information by journalists and private investigators” targeting Harry. NGN strongly denied these allegations before the trial.
“This is a vindication for hundreds of other plaintiffs who were forced into settlements without ever knowing the truth of what was done to them,” Sherborn said outside court. ”.
The root of the bitter feud
Prince Harry’s feud with the press dates back to his youth, when the tabloids gleefully reported on everything from his girlfriend’s injury to his dabbling with drugs.
But his anger with the tabloids runs deeper.
He blames the media for the death of his mother, who died in a car accident in Paris in 1997 while being chased by paparazzi. He also blamed his persistent attacks on his wife, actor Meghan Markle, which led them to leave royal life and flee to the United States in 2020.
The case has caused friction within the family, Prince Harry said in the documentary Tabloid on Trial.
He disclosed in court documents that his father opposed the lawsuit. He also said his brother Prince William, the Prince of Wales and heir to the throne, had settled a private lawsuit against News Group, which his lawyer said was worth more than 1 million pounds ($1.23 million).
“I’m doing this for my own reasons,” Harry told the documentary makers, but he also said he wanted his family to be involved.
Harry and the other resistance
Mr Watson, who was targeted by NGN while participating in an investigation into the tabloid’s alleged misconduct, also said the intrusion had taken a toll on him and his family.
“I once said that the big beasts of the tabloid jungle have no natural enemies,” Watson said. “I was wrong, they have Prince Harry. … We are grateful for his unwavering support and determination under extraordinary pressure.”
Mr Watson also received an apology and a substantive settlement, but called on Mr Murdoch to personally apologize to Mr Harry, the king and “countless others” who had been harmed by the tabloid intrusion. .
End of story?
News Group Newspapers said the settlement is “a departure from the past” and ends more than a decade of litigation.
The company has currently resolved more than 1,300 claims without going to trial. It spent more than 1 billion pounds ($1.24 billion) in payouts and legal costs.
Harry’s lawyer said the company still has questions to answer. Sherborn said the company committed years of “perjury and cover-ups” and deleted 30 million emails and other records to hide the truth.
The statement said there was a “large-scale conspiracy” and that “senior executives deliberately obstructed justice.”
The news group said in a statement that it continues to deny the allegations, saying it will fight the destruction of evidence in court.
Mr Sherborn targeted Rebecca Brooks, the former Sun editor and now CEO who runs the news group, who was acquitted of phone hacking a decade ago.
“At the 2014 trial, Rebecca Brooks said: ‘When I was editor of the Sun, we ran a clean ship,'” he said. “Ten years later, now that she is CEO of the company, they have admitted that she ran a criminal enterprise while she was editor of The Sun.”
NGN apologized for the misconduct committed by civilians employed by The Sun, but did not apologize for the conduct of the paper’s journalists, adding: “There was no interception of voicemails at The Sun.”
2 completed, 1 remaining
Harry’s lawsuit against NGN is one of three in which he accuses the British tabloid of violating his privacy by tapping his phone messages and using private investigators to illegally help him get the scoop. It was.
His case against the publisher of the Daily Mirror newspaper was won after a judge ruled that phone hacking was “widespread and chronic” at the paper and its sister publishers.
During that trial in 2023, Prince Harry became the first senior member of the royal family to testify in court since the late 19th century, putting him at odds with the royal family’s desire to keep the matter under the radar.
The outcome of the News Group lawsuit has raised questions about how his third lawsuit against the Daily Mail publisher will proceed. That trial is scheduled for next year.
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