Prince Harry has won £140,000 from the publisher of the Mirror after the Supreme Court ruled he was the victim of phone hacking.
The Duke of Sussex's case was “partially proven”, said Judge Fancourt. He found that journalists from the Sunday Mirror, People and Daily Mirror had illegally obtained Harry's private information for news purposes.
He concluded that the Duke's phone was likely occasionally hacked “on a modest scale” between 2003 and 2009.
The landmark case concluded in the Supreme Court after a seven-week trial over the summer, in which Harry became the first senior royal to testify in over 100 years.
In a statement from the Duke, read out outside court today by his lawyer David Sherborne, Harry said it was “a great day for truth and responsibility”.
He said: “This case is not just about hacking – it is about a systemic practice of unlawful and appalling behavior followed by cover-ups and destruction of evidence, the shocking extent of which can only be brought to light through these proceedings.”
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex, leaves the Rolls Building of the High Court in London in June. Today he won £140,000 from the editor of the Mirror after the Supreme Court ruled he was the victim of phone hacking
Mr Justice Fancourt found that 15 out of 33 articles about Harry came from hacking attacks.
The judge said: “I assume that his phone was only hacked on a modest scale and that this was probably carefully controlled by certain people at each newspaper. “However, it did occur occasionally between the end of 2003 and April 2009.”
But he said there had been a “tendency” among Harry to assume that whatever was published was the product of voicemail hacking. Of the remaining 18 articles, Harry's claims did not stand up to careful analysis, he said.
The Duke had claimed at least £440,000 in damages. Mr Justice Fancourt awarded him £140,600 and said Harry had become distressed “as a result of the unlawful activities directed against him and those close to him”.
Part of the compensation consisted of “enhanced” damages because the judge ruled that two directors on the Mirror's board had known about the hacking but “turned a blind eye” rather than stopping it.
David Sherborne reads out a written statement on behalf of his client Prince Harry following the ruling in his favor in a lawsuit against Mirror Group. He said: “A great day for truth and responsibility.”
Harry, 39, sued Mirror Group Newspapers for damages, claiming journalists were linked in their titles to methods including phone hacking, so-called “blagging” or obtaining information through deception, and the use of private investigators for unlawful purposes Activities.
The newspaper argued that the stories did not come from hackers, but from other members of the royal family and even from his own interviews.
Harry flew in from America to testify in court, becoming the first senior British royal to do so since 1890.
In his ruling, the judge said phone hacking attacks had occurred on a “large scale” at the three Mirror newspapers generally from 2006 to 2011, “even to some extent during the Leveson Inquiry”.
Following the verdict, Mirror Group Newspapers said: “We welcome today's verdict, which gives the company the clarity it needs to put the events that took place many years ago behind it.” Where historic wrongdoing has occurred, we apologize “Unreservedly, we have accepted full responsibility and paid appropriate compensation.”