The China Mail - Prince Harry lawyer claims 'systematic' UK newspaper group wrongdoing as trial opens

Harry, who returned to London to sit in court for the opening proceedings, is suing Associated Newspapers Ltd (ANL), the publisher of the Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday, over alleged illegal information gathering.

The last unresolved case brought by the royal against several UK newspaper publishers, it involves six other high-profile figures, including pop icon Elton John and his husband David Furnish, and actors Liz Hurley and Sadie Frost.

They claim the tabloids illegally intercepted voicemail messages, listened into phone calls and deceptively obtained private information like phone bills and medical records from at least 1993 to, in some instances, 2018.

They allege ANL used private investigators implicated in other phone hacking lawsuits for the "unlawful information gathering acts" to feed the papers' stories.

ANL has consistently denied the claims, calling them "lurid" and "preposterous".

"We will demonstrate that far from being preposterous, there was clear and systematic use of unlawful gathering of information at both the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday," the claimants' lawyer David Sherborne said in his opening statement.

He added ANL "knew they had skeletons in their closet" and that its "emphatic denials were not true" given the wrongdoing "involved journalists from both the Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday and every significant editorial desk".

- Final case -

It is the third and final case brought against a British newspaper publisher by Harry, who has called it his "mission" to take on the tabloids "for the greater good".

King Charles III's younger son has long blamed the media for the death of his mother Princess Diana, killed in a Paris car crash in 1997 while trying to shake off the paparazzi.

The 41-year-old -- dressed Monday in a navy blue suit and a matching tie -- is set to attend several of the anticipated nine-week trial's opening days, before giving evidence Thursday.

He made history in 2023 by becoming the first senior British royal to take the stand for more than a century, when he testified as part of his successful claim against Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN).

It resulted in a December 2023 High Court ruling that Harry had been a victim of phone hacking by MGN journalists and awarded him £140,600 ($179,600) in damages.

Last year, he also settled in his court action against Murdoch's UK tabloid publisher, which agreed to pay him "substantial damages" after admitting intruding into his private life, including by hacking his phone.

The ANL case will see Hurley also give evidence later in January, followed by John and Furnish in early February. Hurley and Frost were in court Monday to see the trial begin.

- ANL denials -

In legal submissions, their lawyers claimed ANL hired more than a dozen private investigators over the years in focus to conduct unlawful vehicle checks, access flight information such as seat numbers and bank details.

They alleged the investigators would impersonate individuals to obtain information, in a practice known as blagging. They also claim ANL had covered up its use of private investigators through the "mass destruction" of records.

ANL lawyer Antony White countered in written submissions that "editors, desk heads and journalists" are "lining up to reject the claimants' allegations of habitual and widespread phone hacking, phone tapping and blagging within the organisation".

But the submissions do acknowledge some use, "where appropriate", of "third party investigators to obtain information prior to April 2007 when their use was largely banned".

Harry's visit is a rare return to Britain for the prince, also known as the Duke of Sussex, who stepped back from royal duties in 2020 and relocated eventually to California with wife Meghan, where they live with their two children.

During his last UK visit in September, Harry met with the king seeking to start to repair a bitter family rift.

But UK media have said there are no plans for Harry to see his father during this visit.

D.Pan--ThChM