Meghan used letter ‘for media plan’, court told
● Newspaper publisher claims duchess knew it would be revealed
The Duchess of Sussex discussed a letter to her estranged father with the Kensington Palace communications team before she sent it because she wante d to use it “as p a r t of a media strateg y”, the High Court has heard.
Meghan is suing Associate d Ne ws p ap e r s (ANL) ove r the publication in the Mail on Sunday and Mailonline of a “private and confidential” letter sent to Thomas Markle in August 2018.
T h e 3 9 - y e a r - o l d d u c h e s s claims the February 2019 publication of parts of the handwritten letter to Mr Markle, 76, was a misuse of her private information and breached the Data Protection Act, as well as a breach of her copyright.
At t h e l a t e s t p r e l i mi n a r y h e a r i n g i n L o n d o n y e s t e r - day, ANL argued that Meghan wrote the letter to Mr Markle “with a view to it being read by third parties and/or disclosed to the public, or knowing that this was very likely”.
Alexandra Marzec, repre - senting ANL, told the court the duchess “was using her friends as, effectively, PR agents” to “influence the media” in the months before the letter was sent to Mr Markle in 2018. Ms Marzec said Meghan had spoken to her friend Jessica Mulroney and asked her “to intervene to attempt to influence” wh a t h e r f o r me r c o mme r -
cial adviser Gina Nelthorpe - Cowne said to the press.
The publisher is seeking to amend its written defence to Meghan’s claim to argue that a recent book about the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Finding Freedom by Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand, was published “with their extensive cooperation”.
Antony White QC, also representing ANL, said in writ
ten submissions: “The book s e t s o u t i n g r e a t d e t a i l t h e claimant’s feelings on a variety of personal matters, relat i o n s h i p s a n d e v e n t s , a n d attributes multiple quotes to her about her feelings.”
He added: “It also sets out in great detail accounts of events at which it is reason able to infer that only the claimant and her husband, and/or possibly a third party who would not have spoken to the authors (eg the Queen), were present.”
M r W h i t e t o l d t h e c o u r t “there are only three possible ways to account for the inclusion of this information in the book”.
He argued that either Meghan “gave or allowed others to give this information to the authors”.