LONDON.- The prince Harry lost a preliminary round today – December 8 – in his defamation case against the tabloid’s publisher Daily Mail for an article that said he tried to hide his efforts to retain publicly funded protection in the United Kingdom after renouncing his duties to the royal family.
A London High Court judge ruled that Associated Newspapers Ltd. can continue to argue that the story reflected an honest opinion about the facts of the case and was therefore not defamatory. “The publisher, which is the defendant in the case, has real prospects to demonstrate that the public statements issued on Harry’s behalf were misleading,” the judge wrote in his decision.
I anticipate that, at trial, the defendant company could well claim that this was a master class in the art of spinning, wrote Judge Matthew Nicklin. And, the defendant argues, she managed to deceive and/or confuse the public.
A hearing is scheduled for December 12 to discuss the consequences of the ruling.
Harry, the royal family and the British government
The ruling comes just a day after another judge concluded three days of arguments, mostly behind closed doors, over whether the government unfairly stripped Harry of his security detail after he and his family moved to the United States in 2020.
Harry, 39, the youngest son of King Charles III, challenges the Government’s decision to provide security sporadically only when he and his family visit the United Kingdom. The young monarch has said hostility towards him and his wife on social media and relentless harassment by the media threaten his safety.
The Mail on Sunday y Mail Online published an article in February 2022 on the topic titled: How Prince Harry tried to keep his legal fight with the Government over police bodyguards a secret… then, just minutes after the story broke, his machine public relations tried to put a positive spin on the dispute.
Harry claims that the article was fundamentally inaccurate and that the newspaper slandered him when it suggested that he lied in his initial public statements about his case challenging the Government.
Associated Newspapers Ltd. argued that the article expressed an honest opinion and did not seriously damage the prince’s reputation.
Nicklin previously ruled that the article was defamatory, but had not considered whether the story was accurate or in the public interest.
Meanwhile, the Government has defended its decision to withdraw full protection from Harry following his resignation from his duties as a working and senior member of the royal family. The Government noted that he was treated fairly and was occasionally provided security when he visited the country.
Earlier this year, another judge rejected Harry’s request to privately reimburse London police to protect him when he visits Britain. A government lawyer had argued that the agents should not be used as private bodyguards for the wealthy.
The dispute with Mail It is one of four lawsuits that Meghan Markle’s husband has pending against editors of British tabloids in his current battle with the press.
Their other three cases allege that journalists from the Mail, he Daily Mirror y The Sun They used illegal means, such as deception, wiretapping, or hiring private investigators, to try to unearth negative information about him.
FUENTE: AP
