Prince Harry ordered to pay £9.5m towards publisher’s costs
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A High Court judge has confirmed that Prince Harry and his fellow claimants must make an initial payment of £9.5 million towards Associated Newspapers' legal costs, ruling that their phone-hacking-style lawsuit had been pursued in a manner "unreasonable to a high degree." This firms up a costs order previously described only in general terms, delivering a heavy financial penalty in a case that had already largely collapsed before reaching trial.
The lawsuit, filed in 2022 against the Daily Mail's publisher, alleged unlawful information-gathering including phone tapping, burglary and impersonation, and was brought jointly by Harry, Sir Elton John, his husband David Furnish, actress Sadie Frost and Baroness Doreen Lawrence. Much of the claim was struck out in 2023 after a judge found key elements had been brought too late, and the newly specified £9.5 million represents an interim payment on account, with the total costs bill still to be finally assessed.
- Judge orders Harry and co-claimants to pay £9.5m interim costs
- Case against Daily Mail publisher ruled "unreasonable to a high degree"
- Lawsuit largely struck out in 2023 for being brought too late
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Prince Harry has been in a long-running legal dispute with the publisher of the Daily Mail, Associated Newspapers, over how it gathered information for its stories. He brought the case in 2022 together with a group of other public figures, arguing the company had used unlawful methods such as phone tapping, burglary and impersonation.
The publisher has always denied wrongdoing, and much of the claim was thrown out by a judge in 2023, who found that key parts had been brought too late under the rules on time limits for such lawsuits. This left the case significantly weakened, with only a smaller portion able to continue.
Because Harry and the other claimants did not succeed, court rules mean they can be made to cover a share of the publisher's legal expenses. The size of that bill matters because it shows the financial risk of bringing high-profile legal challenges against newspapers, and because Harry has been one of the most prominent and vocal critics of the British press in recent years.
More coverage
- Variety — Prince Harry, Elton John and More Ordered to Pay Initial $13 Million to Daily Mail Publisher After Losing Privacy Case
- BBC Entertainment — Prince Harry and six others ordered to pay initial £9.5m to Daily Mail publisher
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Originally published by Daily Mail as “Prince Harry and fellow claimants must pay millions to Daily Mail after judge rules their doomed hacking case was ‘unreasonable to a high degree’”.