The Duke of Sussex and several claimants suffered a defeat against the publisher of the newspaper
Prince Harry and Baroness Doreen Lawrence have hit out at what they deem to be an "obvious whitewash" following the dismissal of their claims against Associated Newspapers Limited.
Claims that the publisher of the Daily Mail sourced stories using unlawful methods were dismissed by a High Court judge, who said there was not enough evidence to support many of the allegations.
A group of seven, including the Duke of Sussex, alleged that ANL carried out or commissioned unlawful activities such as hiring private investigators to place listening devices inside cars, “blagging” private records and accessing private phone conversations.
ANL strongly denied the claims and defended the case, saying it “has established a complete defence to all parts of the claims on the merits”, and that the cases have been brought too late.
As well as Harry, the claimants included Sir Elton John, his husband David Furnish, campaigner Baroness Doreen Lawrence, actress Sadie Frost, Liz Hurley and politician Sir Simon Hughes.
Prince Harry and Baroness Doreen have issued the following statement: "We came to Court seeking justice and accountability. But we have received neither.
"This judgment represents a complete reversal of the position which previous Judges have taken in relation to the hacking claims successfully brought against both News Group Newspapers and Mirror Group Newspapers (who were represented by, at the time, the Judge who made this decision).
"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.
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"One need not look past when a private investigator the Mail used actually admitted on tape to having unlawfully blagged Baroness Lawrence, or when a journalist recorded the name of the private investigators she used to find out about highly sensitive medical information (that even the Mail was too worried to publish) or when another private investigator emailed one of the journalists with the actual British Airways seat number and ticketing details for a young girl simply visiting her boyfriend in return for payment.
"It feels here like one rule for the newspapers and another for the claimants. While the Claimants presented evidence, Mail journalists simply gave denials, and the Court chose uncritically to believe them, even in the face of inconsistencies, contradictions and blatant untruths that were obvious to neutral observers in Court when compared to the documents.
"We presented to the Court evidence which we believed was compelling at the time and and remains so now.
"We would like to thank our legal team for all their hard work and all the witnesses who were brave enough to came forward in the pursuit of justice."
In a statement after the ruling, ANL’s editor-in-chief Paul Dacre said: “Four years ago, lawyers for Prince Harry, Doreen Lawrence and Elton John accused the Mail, in a blaze of publicity, of placing bugs in homes, cars, cafés and landline phones.
“We described these charges – some related to stories that were over 30 years old – as ‘lurid and preposterous’. Today, in what was a momentous victory for the Mail, the High Court dismissed every single one of the 97 claims.
“That is an overwhelming vindication of our journalism. The Mail’s famous front-page naming five thugs as Stephen Lawrence’s “MURDERERS”, could have seen me jailed for contempt of court.
“Instead, it triggered the Macpherson Inquiry and the eventual jailing of two of the killers. Stephen’s father, Neville, says he owes the Mail everything.
“Why Baroness Lawrence – for whom we have always had profound respect and sympathy – chose to turn on both the paper, and the brilliant reporter who campaigned for justice for her son for over two decades, is something I will never be able to comprehend.”
