A Detailed Coverage of Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's Trial: Scandalous Information That Was Exposed and the Final Decision
Samir Hussein/WireImage
With all the exposing that we’ve done on Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, we haven’t really talked about their ongoing court case against the British media so that’s what we’re going to discuss today.
For starters, they are not suing for defamation as some fans like to believe. That is a common misconception that is thrown around by fans who also tell me, “I hope she sues you next.” Not that easy you sweet delusional people!
Megan is suing the Mail on Sunday’s publishers, Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) for invasion of privacy, infringement of data protection rights and copyright infringement for printing parts of the letter that she wrote to her father, which he gave to the media. If you want a detailed breakdown of everything she’s suing for, you can check out this article.
Back in September 2020, she lost one of the rounds in her court battle with ANL. The reason why she lost was because ANL used the book “Finding Freedom” to their defense by claiming that Meghan was giving information to the authors, Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand.
It’s one of those situations where she was pretending to be so concerned about privacy yet leaking information to authors to write about her and basically fix up her image with this book as damage control. That’s what was used against her in September.
She definitely had a hand in the information that the book ‘exposed.’ After all, the media NEVER had a bridge of information to the royal family before Meghan. Once Hollywood stepped in, that’s when the information started leaking left and right. Some sources even believe that Meghan was behind the “Prince William cheating on Kate Middelton” scandal.
Meghan’s lawyer, Justin Rushbrooke, argued, “The claimant and her husband did not collaborate with the authors on the book, nor were they interviewed for it, nor did they provide photographs to the authors for the book.”
Omid Scobie also denies that Meghan had any sort of operation in the book.
Court documents are alleging that Meghan herself was complicit in releasing her own personal information to the public.
Also, it’s highly UNLIKELY that Meghan had no part of it which brings us to the next part… Meghan lying in court.
Meghan is doing anything she can to avoid a live trial where she will be questioned, confronted by witnesses, and of course face her father, Thomas Markle.
Meghan with her estranged father, Thomas.
So on January 19, 2021, she applied to have the case decided by a summary judgment. A summary judgment is when one party wants the court's decision WITHOUT a trial. Basically, a judge would review the undisputed facts of the case and assess the acceptable evidence that is provided by each party and then come to a final decision.
The Final Decision
By the time you’re reading this post, the court has already granted Meghan’s wish for a summary judgment on February 11. She won her High Court privacy victory over the Mail on Sunday, saying the damage the publisher has done "runs deep".
Mr. Justice Warby authorized Meghan a "summary judgment" in her claim for misuse of private information against the publisher of the Mail on Sunday and MailOnline which means that part of the case is settled without a trial.
However, he said there would be a further hearing in March to reach a decision on the next legal steps.
His decision to grant Meghan a summary judgment was because:
"The majority of what was published was about the claimant's own behavior, her feelings of anguish about her father's behavior - as she saw it - and the resulting rift between them. These are inherently private and personal matters. There is no prospect that a different judgment would be reached after a trial."
In a statement from Meghan, she said that "For these outlets, it's a game. For me and so many others, it's real life, real relationships, and very real sadness. … The damage they have done and continue to do runs deep."
She said that her "comprehensive win" means "we have all won. … We now know, and hope it creates legal precedent, that you cannot take somebody's privacy and exploit it in a privacy case, as the defendant has blatantly done over the past two years."
A spokesperson for ANL expressed their surprise and disappointment. They said, "We are carefully considering the judgment's contents and will decide in due course whether to lodge an appeal."
The court dismissed ANL’s claims on copyright & privacy, but now they are discussing WHOSE copyright has been breached considering there are witnesses attesting that Meghan wasn’t the sole writer of the letter (I’ll get to that part).
Harry has settled his case against the Mail on Sunday and Meghan has won hers.
Everything That Was Exposed In Court Documents
The case was originally supposed to start on January 11, but Meghan was able to get the proceedings delayed.
The media isn’t intensely covering the trial despite all the crazy juicy details in the court documents, so I will. Here’s the information that was revealed by the documents that were submitted by Defendant (ANL) on why they should proceed with a live trial as opposed to a summary trial.
They are arguing that they need a trial because of the following claims:
Meghan has repeatedly changed statements several times and lied in court documents. The official court documents state that “There are now on the record a number of inconsistent statements made by her that she will need to explain.”
They argued that they have a lot of different sources that can prove what they’re saying as well as stressed out how important they need this case to go to trial so they can cross-examine everything.
They claim that Meghan had help from the palace staff to write the letter to her father which means that the copyright doesn’t go to Meghan…. but it would actually be considered Crown Copyright.
plot…. twist.
They claim that:
Sunshine Sachs (the American PR firm that Meghan hired) representatives helped open doors for the authors of the book.
Sara Latham fact checked Finding Freedom by Meghan’s request.
they have 4 palace aids (which are former Sussex staff) who are willing to give witness statements on the Mail on Sunday’s behalf.
I don’t think Meghan thought that it would start to backfire in her face the way it did and I know that’s why she wanted a summary judgment.
Here they’re saying that Meghan doesn’t have proper evidence to disprove anything that was published against her:
Meghan is also facing some heat under the circumstances of what she said about the letter because of the contradictions that are being made:
To read more in depth about the Skeleton Argument for Summary Judgment, click here.
The Signed Witness Statement of Edward Verity, Editor of Mail, goes into detail about the events that led up to where we are today.
Some key details from his statement are:
The Mail on Sunday publishes regular stories about the royal family due to the interest of the readers and that “all members of the royal family enjoy immense wealth and privilege and cost the British taxpayer a significant amount of money.” He’s basically saying it’s a small price for them to pay [to be written about] when they are enjoying enormous privileges. He also adds that there is “a proper public interest in the conduct of the royal family” which is expected considering their royal weddings and royal births are major national events.
He goes into detail about how People magazine published a feature about Meghan in February 2019, which was “a flattering portrayal” of her. Information was provided by 5 of her friends. The information in this article included “a description of the contents of the letter she had written him (the subject-matter of this claim) and of the letter he had written to her in response, and the Claimant’s [Meghan] reaction that response.”
People Magazine’s article was a major news event and it was picked up by several other media outlets. It was considered a huge story because a member of the royal family used close friends “to promote a highly flattering image of herself in an American media outlet.” This was basically a nice way of calling her out for damage control & planned stories in the media—which is a topic that we talk about on this blog quite often.
He also writes that they reached out to the magazine’s LA based reporter, Caroline Graham who was in touch with Meghan’s father previously. He wanted to release the letter because he claimed that the People article which broke down his relationship with Meghan, was “seriously misrepresented.” At the time, it was promoted that the letter was supposed to REPAIR their relationship, but that was false—something that Meghan has now admitted to.
They are arguing that Thomas Markle wanted to set the record straight about what actually happened which led to the release of the letter. “He did not want the whole letter published because he thought it made his daughter look terrible, but he wanted to show people that what they might have read in People magazine was inaccurate and unfair to him.”
He also speaks about how despite Meghan denying it, she “had used the media, that is People magazine, to promote a particular, very positive, loving and caring image of herself that she wanted in the media.”
Didn’t I tell you that celebrities often work with the media as part of their agenda, especially when it comes to the likes of People Magazine, E! News, US Weekly, and so on?
This is where we come to the important part—the letter isn’t only Meghan’s work. She is suing on the basis of copyright infringement and that the letter is HERS however… other sources allege otherwise.
In Keith Mathieson’s statement (he’s the sixth witness who is a partner at Reynolds Porter Chamberlain LLP), he says that there are “good reasons to infer that the Claimant caused or permitted these friends to provide information to the People and they did so with her knowledge and consent.” He also states that Meghan never denied that she was involved in the People interview in some way.
If you remember, months ago we spoke about how Meghan did have a hand in the interview and was behind it all. She hasn’t denied that as we can see by his statement and the documents submitted to the court. This is important to understand because she’s suing because she wants privacy—and that the media has been horrible to her and whatnot, but…… she is playing the same media game that she’s suing against.
This is a constant theme we see from celebrities so if you’re one of our regular readers, you can use this newfound information and apply it to any celebrity and the media.
Keith Mathieson states that the book, Finding Freedom, “contained a great deal of intensely personal information about the Claimant [Meghan] and indeed others, including information about the Claimant’s relationship and communications with her father. The entire work is written from the Claimant’s point of view and is very sympathetic to her.”
He then argues that Meghan hasn’t complained to the authors or publishers of the book about the book in terms of privacy and inaccuracy considering she frequently expressed how much she values personal privacy.
Basically…. how are you complaining about privacy yet you don’t have any problem with this book that is rumored to be written with your compliance, which goes into detail about your personal life?
“Her failure to complain about the Book gives rise to a very strong inference that there was an express or implied understanding between her or her agents and the authors that she did not object to the Book.”
Yikes……..
He continues by saying that considering Meghan is so privacy driven, it’s shocking to see that the authors weren’t concerned by offending Meghan and getting in a legal battle with her. Therefore, it begs the idea that Meghan was involved with the process of the book which gives the publishers of the book confidence that they will not be getting sued by her.
“I infer from the fact that the publisher proceeded with publication of a book which contained a great deal of personal information that the publisher was satisfied by the authors that they had an understanding with the Claimant that no action would be taken.”
He also brings up a valid argument of what was discussed in the Author’s Note which states that the authors spoke to Meghan & Harry and that it seems unlikely that their close friends would speak to the authors without their approval.
For his complete statement, read more here.
What does this all mean?
In a nutshell, there is sufficient evidence and witnesses (which were dismissed by the court at an effort of summary judgment, but nonetheless never disproven) that Meghan had:
help writing the letter.
was involved in the creation of ‘Finding Freedom,’ which was a book written as damage control to repair Meghan’s image for her questionable reasons as to why she married into the royal family and then left.
there were inconsistent and inaccurate statements made by Meghan in court.
she does use the media, specifically the American media, to portray a flattering image of herself.
However, she was still granted summary judgment and she won on the grounds of privacy & copyright infringement.
I personally think that it would have looked bad on their part if she didn’t win only because she was suing on the basis that her privacy was invaded more than anything else. Everything that came to light in court EXPOSED Meghan and further showed her as a fraud, but at the same time, it didn’t disprove that her privacy was invaded. That is why she won and in all honesty, she had a right to win because this would have stirred up a bigger topic.
However, this begs the question: is Meghan’s right to privacy more important than her father’s right to free speech? Under Article 10 of the Human Rights Act 1998, “everyone has the right to freedom of expression” in the UK. By the way, this law always states that this freedom “may be subject to formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society.”
A big reason why celebrities don’t go to court is because they end up revealing more than they intended to. Even if they are right in one subject; by opening up that one subject, they risk opening up other subjects where they will get exposed one way or another. So even though Meghan won, it wasn’t done so without other facts coming to light about her.
From the start, all Meghan and Harry did was cry about privacy, but what do their actions show? They moved to LA to pursue Meghan’s failed Hollywood dreams. Meghan continues to cry about privacy but what does she do? Have a hand in publishing a book to make her look good while also selling information about herself to the media.
The game that Meghan is playing, she doesn’t want to be played against her.
It’s also dumbfoundingly inaccurate to continuously compare Meghan to the late Princess Diana. Diana’s life was constantly put in danger from how paparazzi approached her by chasing her around wherever she went. That was never the case for Meghan. Comparing Meghan’s experience to Diana’s is like comparing a random like Dua Lipa to the terror that Britney Spears experienced in the media.
She wants to utilize the media all she wants, but she doesn’t want the media to retaliate. All in all, it’s quite obvious that she is a hypocrite. Just like she has the right to sue for whatever she thinks is necessary, we have a right to talk about a newsworthy topic that makes a living off of being the public figure that she is today.
There’s nothing we hate more on exposingsmg than hypocrites!
I hope you guys enjoyed this deep dive into the court trial that Meghan Markle & Prince Harry unleashed on the British media. Be sure to leave me your thoughts in the comment section down below.
Do you think Meghan should have won in the trial? Why or why not? What are your thoughts about everything that has come to light from the trial? Comment down below! You can comment anonymously so take advantage of that. I will be reading and replying!