Prince Harry's legal battle against News Corp's British tabloids is anticipated to proceed to trial in early 2025, as revealed in a High Court hearing in London on Tuesday.
Prince Harry, the younger son of King Charles and the late Princess Diana, has filed a lawsuit against News Group Newspapers (NGN) for alleged invasions of privacy by its tabloids, the Sun and the now-defunct News of the World. These alleged invasions of privacy span from the mid-1990s to 2016.
This lawsuit is one of four cases initiated by the 39-year-old prince, who currently resides in California with his wife Meghan and their two children, targeting British publishers. Prince Harry has framed these legal actions as a mission to hold tabloid executives accountable for their deception and cover-ups of widescale wrongdoing.
Initially, Harry's case against NGN was set for trial in January of the upcoming year, following a judge's ruling in July, allowing his claims involving "blagging" confidential details and other unlawful invasions of privacy to proceed.
However, recent court filings during a preliminary hearing on Tuesday indicate that Prince Harry's case is now slated for a later trial, expected to commence in January 2025. His lawyer, David Sherborne, mentioned that Harry's case, along with a similar lawsuit brought by British actor Hugh Grant, is among 27 claims temporarily on hold pending the 2025 trial.
NGN is vigorously defending Prince Harry's lawsuit. In July, when the royal's claims of phone hacking dating back decades were dismissed, NGN celebrated the ruling as a "significant victory," asserting that it finally put an end to the accusations that have haunted the publisher since 2005.
In 2012, NGN issued an apology for extensive hacking conducted by journalists at the News of the World. This led News Corp's former chairman, Australian-born media magnate Rupert Murdoch, to shut down the newspaper amid public outrage. However, the group consistently denied any wrongdoing by its Sun staff. NGN has reached settlements in over a thousand phone-hacking cases, all without admitting liability concerning the Sun.
In a significant move earlier this year, Prince Harry became the first senior British royal to provide testimony in court in over a century. This occurred as part of another lawsuit targeting Mirror Group Newspapers, emphasizing his commitment to addressing media practices and privacy violations. Photo by DoD News, Wikimedia commons.