Prince Harry loses High Court case against Daily Mail

Prince Harry and six other high-profile claimants have lost their High Court case against Associated Newspapers Ltd, publisher of the Daily Mail, in a ruling that is likely to draw a line under the UK’s long-running phone-hacking litigation.

Mr Justice Nicklin dismissed all claims against the publisher after an 11-week trial, finding that the claimants had failed to prove the information in the articles at the centre of the case had been obtained through unlawful means.

The group of claimants – Prince Harry, singer Elton John, David Furnish, actors Elizabeth Hurley and Sadie Frost, former Liberal Democrat minister Simon Hughes and Doreen Lawrence, the mother of murdered teenager Stephen Lawrence – alleged that Associated had engaged in systematic unlawful information gathering over two decades.

Their legal team said the publisher had carried out “habitual and widespread” wrongdoing, including phone hacking, tapping landlines, bugging homes and cars and making corrupt payments to police officers to obtain stories. The case focused on 55 articles published between 1997 and 2015.

In his judgment, Mr Justice Nicklin said the claimants had not established that the information was obtained illegally. He said the court could not infer unlawful activity simply because it was one possible explanation for how a story had been sourced if there was also a realistic lawful alternative.

Throughout the trial, Associated rejected the allegations, describing them as “lurid” and “preposterous”. The publisher said its reporting came from legitimate sources, including press officers, public records and information circulating within celebrities’ social circles.

Following the ruling, an Associated spokesperson described the decision as “an overwhelming victory for the Daily Mail and its journalists, and for a free press generally”, adding that it represented “a magnificent vindication”.

The spokesperson said no credible evidence had been produced to support some of the most serious allegations, including claims that journalists had bugged homes and cars, intercepted live telephone calls or accessed bank accounts unlawfully. They added that the judgment had fully vindicated the company’s journalists.

The decision leaves the claimants facing a substantial legal bill, with the total cost of the litigation estimated at up to £50 million.

Prince Harry played a central role in the case, becoming the first claimant to give evidence. He told the court that reporting by the Mail’s titles had made his wife’s life “an absolute misery”. Former Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre was among dozens of editors and journalists who gave evidence denying the allegations.

The judgment marks a significant victory for Associated and a setback for Prince Harry’s wider campaign against sections of the British tabloid press. It is also expected to reduce the prospect of further large-scale civil litigation arising from historic allegations of unlawful newsgathering.