Prince Harry and Lady Doreen Lawrence have criticised the dismissal of their case against the publisher of the Daily Mail, describing the ruling as a “complete and obvious whitewash”, arguing that it failed to deliver the justice and accountability sought.
Prince Harry and six other high-profile claimants lost their case today against the publisher of the Daily Mail and its sister paper, the Mail on Sunday, over claims of unlawful information gathering.
In a joint statement after the ruling, Harry and Lady Lawrence said the ruling was a “complete reversal of the position which previous judges have taken in relation to the hacking claims” brought against News Group Newspapers, publisher of The Sun and the defunct News of the World, and Mirror Group Newspapers, publisher of the Mirror.
Tuesday's ruling followed an 11-week High Court trial, which concluded in March, in which the Duke of Sussex, Sir Elton John and other high-profile claimants accused Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) of carrying out "grave breaches of privacy" over a 20-year period.
The claimants alleged that dozens of articles published in the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday, between the 1990s and 2011 were based on information obtained through unlawful methods, including phone hacking and blagging.
ANL, publisher of the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday, strongly denied the allegations and rejected all claims of wrongdoing.
The statement by Harry and Lady Lawrence said: “We came to court seeking justice and accountability. But we have received neither.
“Generic findings about various private investigators that were held by the courts in these parallel claims to have carried out unlawful activity at the very same time in relation to similar stories and well-known individuals have been wholly ignored.
“The fact that this court has chosen to dismiss them represents an inconsistency which is hard to understand or reconcile with common sense, or the evidence heard in the court room itself.
“It is a complete and obvious whitewash, but sadly not altogether unexpected.
“However, the lengths to which the court has gone to exonerate the Mail is as shocking as it is totally unwarranted.
“When the court says there is not sufficient evidence of wrongdoing, despite the documents showing otherwise, then one does wonder how justice was ever going to be achieved.”
Reacting to the judgement, former deputy leader of the Liberal Democrats, Sir Simon Hughes, described the ruling as “disappointing”.
He said in a statement: "The judgment in the case against ANL is naturally very disappointing for me, and I am sure for all other claimants.
"I shall take time to consider the lengthy judgment in detail and plan to make no further comment in the near future."
In a decision on Tuesday, judge Mr Justice Nicklin dismissed all of the claims, ruling that none of the group of seven had proven the allegations of unlawful information gathering.
The judge said the allegations were serious and therefore required more convincing evidence before they could be proven.
He added the seven claimants could not rely on "suspicion, even where understandable", and had to prove that the information had been obtained unlawfully.
Following the judgment, ANL’s editor in chief Paul Dacre said the “trumped-up action”, which has cost over £50million, “should never have been brought to trial”.
“That it did, raises profoundly disturbing questions about the conduct of elements of the legal profession,” he added.
In a statement following the High Court’s ruling, Daily Mail publisher Associated Newspapers said: “Associated Newspapers welcomes today’s judgment, which is an overwhelming victory for the Daily Mail and its journalists, and for a free press generally.
“Mr Justice Nicklin today cleared the Daily Mail and The Mail on Sunday, and dismissed every single one of the 97 allegations made by the claimants.
“In every case, the judge accepted the honesty of our journalists’ evidence on how they sourced their stories. This is a magnificent vindication of the Daily Mail’s journalism.
“For some of the most outrageous allegations made when the case was launched in a blaze of publicity four years ago – placing bugs in people’s cars and homes, listening to calls as they were made and illicitly accessing bank accounts – no credible evidence was ever presented.
“As we said at the time, these allegations were ‘lurid’ and ‘preposterous’, and were a fishing expedition by the claimants and their legal teams in a politically motivated campaign to muzzle the free press.
“The reputations of our decent and hard-working journalists were terribly impugned, and today they have been exonerated.
“As the judgment clearly shows, every single article was legitimately sourced.
“Associated Newspapers thanks Mr Justice Nicklin for the patience and wisdom he has displayed throughout this misguided legal action, which has wasted so much valuable court time and more than £50 million in legal costs.
“We will look to resolve outstanding issues, including the recovery of the costs we have incurred while defending ourselves against this egregious litigation.”
