Meghan Markle fighting to keep identities of mysterious ‘five friends’ hidden

Meghan Markle has lost the first round of her legal battle against a tabloid publisher - and it’s going to cost her a lot of money.

Meghan Markle has lost the first round of her court battle against a tabloid publisher - and has agreed to pay £67,000 ($121,000) in legal costs.

The Duchess of Sussex is suing the publisher of the Mail on Sunday newspaper and the MailOnline website at Britain’s High Court over five articles that published portions of a handwritten letter she wrote to her estranged father, Thomas Markle, after her marriage to Prince Harry in 2018.

But a High Court Justice struck out parts of Meghan’s claim in May, including allegations of “deliberately stirring up” issues between her and her father.

The Mail reports that a written submission from July 22 showed Markle agreed to pay in full the publisher’s costs for the strike-out hearing of £67,888.

It comes as lawyers for Markle asked a judge at a London court on Wednesday to keep the names of five of her friends out of the public domain as she wages a privacy-infringement battle against a British newspaper.

Meghan’s lawyer said the female friends, who defended her in anonymous magazine interviews last year, are innocent parties who fear intrusion if their names come out. The target of her lawsuit, Associated Newspapers Ltd, argues that the principle of open justice – the public’s right to know – means the friends should be identified.

Meghan is fighting hard to keep the identities of her friends private. Picture: Daniel Leal-Olivas/AFP

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Meghan, 38, is seeking damages from the publisher for alleged misuse of private information, copyright infringement and data protection breaches. Her lawyers say publishing the letter was “a flagrant and unjustified intrusion into her private and family life.”

Associated Newspapers says it will strongly contest the claim.

At a half-day pre-trial hearing, Meghan’s lawyers asked Judge Mark Warby to prohibit publishing the personal details of the friends who spoke to People magazine in early 2019 to condemn alleged bullying of the Duchess by the UK press.

The women’s names are included in a confidential court document, but they have been identified in public only as A to E.

Meghan’s lawyer, Justin Rushbrooke, argued that the court had a duty to “protect the identity of confidential journalistic sources”.

He said that with the full high-profile libel trial yet to begin, the court should be cautious and protect “the innocent party who fears intrusion”.

Actress Sarah Rafferty, pictured here at Meghan and Harry’s wedding, is rumoured to be one of the ‘five friends’. Picture: Getty

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But the Mail’s lawyer, Antony White, said granting anonymity would undermine the “vitally important open justice principle”.

“The friends are important potential witnesses on a key issue,” Mr White said in a written argument. He said removing their names “would be a heavy curtailment of the media’s and the defendant’s entitlement to report this case and the public’s right to know about it”.

Associated Newspapers said it was Meghan’s friends who brought the letter to Thomas Markle into the public domain by describing it in the People article. It argues that details of the letter in that article must have come “directly or indirectly” from the Duchess.

But Mr Rushbrooke said Meghan did not know at the time that her friends were speaking to the magazine. He said the anonymous interviews were arranged by one of the five friends, who was concerned about the toll media criticism was taking on the Duchess, pregnant at the time with her first child.

In a witness statement submitted in the case, Meghan said: “Each of these women is a private citizen, young mother, and each has a basic right to privacy.”

It’s understood Meghan did not know her five friends were speaking to the media anonymously. Picture: GMA

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“These five women are not on trial, and nor am I,” she wrote. “The publisher of the Mail on Sunday is the one on trial. It is this publisher that acted unlawfully and is attempting to evade accountability; to create a circus and distract from the point of this case – that the Mail on Sunday unlawfully published my private letter.”

Meghan, former star of the TV legal drama Suits, married Queen Elizabeth II’s grandson Harry in a lavish ceremony at Windsor Castle in May 2018. Their son Archie was born the following year.

In January, the couple announced they were stepping back as senior members of the royal family.

Neither Harry nor Meghan appeared in court for Wednesday’s hearing. The judge said he would give his ruling “as soon as I can”.

This story originally appeared on Fox News and is republished here with permission