Emotional Harry ‘went to court for Meghan’

During an emotional final day of evidence, Prince Harry said he hoped his case would stop the ‘abuse, intrusion and hate’ towards him and his wife.

Prince Harry gives a thumbs up as he leaves after court giving evidence at the Mirror Group phone hacking trial. Picture: Getty Images.

The Duke of Sussex said during an emotional final day of evidence yesterday that he hoped his High Court case would stop the “abuse, intrusion and hate” towards him and his wife.

Prince Harry appeared to fight back tears when asked after eight hours of questioning how he felt about being the victim of alleged phone hacking.

“I could have been hacked on a daily basis, I simply don’t know,” he had told the court earlier. “That is part of the reason I am here.”

He recalled his distress at tabloid stories about a 12th birthday visit from his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, after her divorce from his father, and the end of his own relationship with his first serious girlfriend, Chelsy Davy.

Prince Harry and barrister David Sherborne leave court. Picture: Getty Images.

Harry, 38, said he brought the privacy case having “bumped into” the celebrity barrister David Sherborne in France. He described in his memoir Spare talking to a barrister in 2019 while he and Meghan were visiting Sir Elton John.

“It was a discussion to somehow find a way to stop the abuse, intrusion and hate that was coming towards me and my wife,” Harry told the court.

The duke, the first senior royal to give evidence in court for 130 years, was more assured on his second day of evidence, having struggled on Tuesday to justify claims that he was the victim of unlawful information-gathering by the publisher of the Daily Mirror.

In his final question Sherborne asked how Harry felt after spending a day and a half in the witness box “with the world’s media watching”. The duke sat back and remained silent for several seconds as he blinked repeatedly, before replying slowly: “It’s a lot.”

The duke had claimed there was “phone hacking on an industrial scale” at the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and Sunday People. The intrusion meant it was “very hard to trust anyone, which led to bouts of depression and paranoia”, he said.

The case continues.

The Times