Prince Harry Questioned On Information He Believes Unlawfully Obtained By Press

Prince Harry has attacked the “vile” press in his attempts to support allegations that Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) engaged in phone-hacking to source information in published stories about him.

In his historic court appearance (the first senior royal to appear on the stand in over a century), Prince Harry revealed his deep suspicions of the press, however MGN’s lawyers said he was able to provide little concrete evidence.

Thirty-three articles published between 1991 and 2011 are in question, which Prince Harry alleged were used to destroy his relationship with girlfriends, causing friendship circles to shrink and in part of the reasons of him developing depression and paranoia.

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Prince Harry spent a day being cross-examined by MGN’s defence lawyer Andrew Green KC, where the pair went through each of the articles, questioning the prince on possible sources of specific information he has issues with.

Mr Green then asked Prince Harry to be more specific about his allegations of phone hacking to understand more details of his case.

“You should ask the journalist in question,” Prince Harry said.

“I do not believe that as a witness it’s my job to deconstruct the article or be able to answer which parts are unlawfully obtained and which aren’t.”

When Prince Harry was asked to identify whose phones he believed were hacked, he did not name one person.

“We are, Prince Harry, in the realm of total speculation,” Mr Green responded.

MGN has admitted to previously phone hacking to gather information for stories, but denies this practice was used in the cases alleged by Prince Harry. MGN have settled more than 600 claims for phone-hacking.

The group argued that most of the information in the 33 articles weren’t obtained unlawfully and were actually public knowledge, or came from Buckingham palace spokespersons.

More witnesses will take the stand in the upcoming days, including two Mirror journalists, while Prince Harry will return again on Wednesday morning.

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