The claimants, including Sir Elton John, his husband David Furnish, Baroness Lawrence of Clarendon, Sadie Frost, Liz Hurley and Sir Simon Hughes, have accused the newspaper group of carrying out or commissioning unlawful activities such as hiring private investigators to place listening devices inside cars, “blagging” private records, burglaries to order, and accessing and recording private phone conversations.
Associated is seeking to limit the scope of the legal action, arguing that specific elements of the claimants’ case should be thrown out, such as arguments relating to the Duke’s previous legal battles with other newspaper publishers, which Mr Justice Nicklin has already ruled should not be included.
David Sherborne, for the group, claims that an invoice dated August 25, 2003, was entitled “Out of Africa Story Royal Party Enqs”.
The barrister alleged this invoice was linked to a Daily Mail story from June that year with “extensive” details about Prince William’s 21st birthday party – the day before the celebration was due to take place.
Sherborne added that an invoice from a different private investigator allegedly shows a journalist commissioning him to provide a “mobile phone conversion” related to the Princess of Wales, as well as phone numbers from a “family and friends” list.
The lawyer said that in seeking to prove his claim, the duke will rely on an entry found in a spreadsheet belonging to Steve Whittamore, a retired British private investigator convicted in 2004 of breaching the Data Protection Act.
Loading
It emerged in 2011 that Whittamore had been asked to obtain confidential information about Catherine Middleton, now the Princess of Wales, when she was a student at St Andrews University.
He kept four colour-coded A4 books detailing his business dealings with journalists, one of which revealed he had been given her mobile phone number.
Sherborne states that the “yellow book” also contained “two occupancy searches relating to Middleton’s family address”, as well as 10 phone numbers from a “family and friends” list, “in which Whittamore identified Catherine’s mobile phone number”.
Associated argued that the Daily Mail journalist named in relation to Whittamore’s Middleton file was not involved in the claim.
The publisher also pointed out that the information relating to the Middleton family was first disclosed in the Operation Motorman books, which were “in the claimants’ control” and were widely reported more than 10 years ago, suggesting that as such, the proposed amendment was “very late”.
Justice Nicklin also expressed frustration that changes were being made so close to the trial.
“We are now two months away from the trial date, and here you are with amendments that could have been put forward years ago,” he told Sherborne.
Antony White, KC, for the publisher, told the court that lawyers for Harry and the others were either being “tin-eared” or openly defiant.
Sherborne said in court filings that such a “nuclear option” was unjustified. He argued that the generic case was “a critical and fundamental component” of the lawsuit.
A trial is scheduled to begin in January.
The latest revelations mark the second time that the duke has involved his brother in his legal battles against the tabloid press.
In March 2023, he revealed that the prince had quietly settled a phone hacking claim for a “very large sum” against News Group Newspapers (NGN), the publisher of The Sun, three years earlier.
The Prince of Wales allegedly received the payment, understood to have been for about £1 million, in 2020 after bringing a legal claim against the owner of The Sun and now-defunct News of the World newspaper.
The details were revealed in documents submitted by the duke as part of his own legal battle with NGN as he argued that it proved the existence of a “secret agreement” made between the royal household and the publisher, which he believed was made in part to help rehabilitate the Queen. The judge later told the duke that he found the prospect of such a deal “implausible”.
The latest references to the Waleses are made in court documents lodged with the court as part of a two-day case-management hearing in the Associated case.
The hearing continues.
The Telegraph, London
