In May 2023, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and Doria Ragland attended the Ms. Foundation event in New York. It was an evening event, and while Meghan and Harry mostly ducked the paparazzi going into the event, they left the event through one of the main doors and that allowed paparazzi to get some shots of Harry and Meghan as their security led them to their cars. Once the Sussexes and their security left the scene, all hell broke loose. Paparazzi and, um, other cars and SUVs tried to chase down the Sussexes’ vehicles. It was a chaotic scene which could have cost lives. The Sussexes’ security took them into a police station at one point because the situation was so dire. What happened after the paparazzi chase was a whole lotta nothing – Mayor Eric Adams downplayed the incident, and the British media decided, without evidence, that Harry and Meghan fantasized the entire incident and they were clearly lying. To this day, no arrests have been made and there have been no updates on the investigation. Until now! Apparently, Harry spent months demanding a real investigation and demanding that arrests be made. The Daily Mail got their hands on some documentation via FOIA requests.
Prince Harry pressured New York cops to speed up their investigation and make arrests after their ‘high speed’ chase with photographers through the streets of Manhattan. He even claimed there was a cover-up, letters and emails obtained by DailyMail.com show.
‘The duke feels intentionally misled and is suspicious of a cover-up,’ one missive from his security company to the New York Police Department said. Harry also demanded that arrests be made the very next day and threatened to make an official complaint. The demand came after John Hart, the NYPD’s top intelligence officer, had sent police in London two letters, one saying there was not enough evidence to make arrests and a second – three months later – saying there was. To date, no arrests have been made in connection with the May 2023 incident.
Hart’s original letter was sent in September 2023. The second arrived on December 6 that year, midway through a hearing in London when he was trying to get the British government to pay for protection for him and his family while visiting the UK. But TorchStone then sent an email saying Harry was upset at the slow pace of the NYPD’s investigation and felt ‘intentionally misled’.
Harry even asked California Governor Gavin Newsom for a contact with the prosecutors in New York – and wanted to take the matter higher if ‘necessary’.
Emails obtained by DailyMail.com through a Freedom of Information request show that Harry’s team repeatedly pressed the NYPD about the incident. The first letter from the NYPD was dated September 18, 2023, and was addressed to Richard Smith, the Chief Superintendent Commander for Royalty and Specialty Protection at the Metropolitan Police in London.
The letter says that a thorough review of the incident had taken place and they concluded ‘that the behavior in question was reckless’, but they didn’t have enough evidence to make an arrest. In a statement at the time, the NYPD said there were ‘numerous photographers that made their (the Sussexes) transport challenging’. ‘The Duke and Duchess of Sussex arrived at their destination and there were no reported collisions, summonses, injuries, or arrests in regard,’ said Julian Phillips, the Deputy Commissioner for Public Information.
Hart later met with three people from TorchStone for 30 minutes on Microsoft Teams. The subject of the visit was: ‘NYC Visit of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’, referring to the planned visit that October by the Sussexes to New York for World Mental Health Day. Then, on December 6, Hart sent the second letter to police in London, copying it to TouchStone under the subject line ‘as discussed’. The letter was the same as the first, with one key difference – there was now ‘sufficient evidence to arrest two individuals for reckless endangerment’.
The second letter appeared to provide a sense of vindication for the Sussexes and arrived at a crucial time for the Duke. December 6 was the second day of a three-day hearing at the High Court in London where he was trying to compel the British government to give him full royal security protection while on visits to the UK.
The Mail won’t come out and say it, but they’re insinuating that Harry pulled strings to force the NYPD to exaggerate the paparazzi chase as a way to strengthen Harry’s security case in England. Obviously, Harry would sue the Mail (again) if they came right out and said that, so that’s why it’s merely an insinuation. For what it’s worth, I always believed that the paparazzi chase was really dangerous and I also believe that the people chasing the Sussexes were not solely paparazzi. Their actions were not “photographers hunting for a million-dollar photo.” I also found it suspicious that the NYPD was seemingly fine with shrugging off the investigation, and yet the same police department gave the Sussexes really hardcore protection when they visited months later. Which is it – were the Sussexes exaggerating the danger they faced, or did the NYPD not want to get blamed if they allowed Harry & Meghan to be in that kind of danger again?
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Photos courtesy of Backgrid.
