Here are some photos of Prince Harry arriving at the Royal Court of Justice this morning, and I’m also including some pics of Harry at court yesterday. On Tuesday, Harry attended the morning session of the case, but he exited when the court adjourned for lunch and didn’t come back. It was around that time that the Mail’s lawyers played a “dirty trick,” in Tom Sykes’ words. The Mail/ANL’s lawyers were supposed to have two days for their opening statements, which would have meant that Harry would testify first on Thursday. Well, ANL’s lawyers abruptly shortened their opening statements and pushed for Harry to testify today in court. I can only assume that the purpose of this was to knock Harry off his game, but I think it’s notable that ANL’s defense is so pitiful, they found they didn’t actually need all of that time for their opening statement, which mostly consisted of attempted character assassination of Harry alone (with little to no mention of the five other plaintiffs). A source close to Harry spoke to the Times about the change of dates for Harry’s testimony:
The Duke of Sussex has accused the publisher of The Daily Mail of “dirty tricks” after he was required to give evidence in his privacy trial a day earlier than expected. Harry was scheduled to enter the witness box at the High Court on Thursday but his appearance was brought forward after the barrister for Associated Newspapers Ltd (ANL) took just 75 minutes to open his case.
A source close to Harry said: “ANL, publishers of The Daily Mail, The Mail on Sunday and MailOnline, and their legal team, have had months to inform the court that their opening argument would last less than two hours. Instead, they have had to resort to game playing and dirty tricks — consistent with the way they have treated not just the duke but all of the victims in this case.”
“They think that by pulling the schedule forward 24 hours they are giving Prince Harry less time to prepare. He’s been preparing for this moment for the last three years. Safe to say, he’s ready.”
David Sherborne, barrister for Prince Harry and other celebrities, complained on Wednesday that Antony White KC, representing the publisher, did not use the day and a half scheduled for his opening statement. Mr Justice Nicklin, the trial judge, dismissed the complaint saying White could not know how long he would take until he had heard Sherborne’s own opening comments.
White had accused Harry’s lawyers of “clutching at straws” after Sherborne said evidence of payments from private investigators showed they were involved in unlawful information gathering for the publisher.
From what I gather, many royalists and reporters were genuinely surprised when David Sherborne laid out the plaintiffs’ case. Those people huff their own supply, and they believe that they can dictate everything about these lawsuits and create their own reality. But Sherborne made it clear that the use of private investigators was widespread across the Mail for decades, and it wasn’t just one guy (Gavin Burrows) endlessly perjuring himself. I will update this post when we get more info!
You can follow Harry’s testimony at the Guardian’s live blog – Harry is really going after ANL’s lawyer and the claims that Becky English and Katie Nicholl were somehow in his social circle or friends in any way.
Update: Harry’s testimony is apparently over – ANL’s lawyer claimed that they would need to question Harry for a day or longer, but they only needed two hours, and they didn’t even ask him about many of the articles in his suit. Harry’s final words of testimony were about how this years-long process has been hellish and that ANL/the Mail “have made my wife’s life an absolute misery, my Lord.”
Thank you!
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Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Backgrid.
