Duchess hopes to avoid trial

LONDON • A tabloid’s publication of a deeply personal letter written by Meghan, the duchess of Sussex, to her father was a “plain breach” of privacy, her lawyers told a court Tuesday and said the judge should rule in her favour without need for a trial.

Meghan, 39, is suing publisher Associated Newspapers after its Mail on Sunday paper printed extracts of a handwritten letter she sent to her estranged father, Thomas Markle, in August 2018.

At the start of two days of remote hearings, Meghan’s lawyer, Justin rushbrooke, asked a London High Court judge to issue a summary judgment without a potentially embarrassing trial. The Mail on Sunday, he argued, had no prospect of winning what he called a “plain and serious” breach of her privacy and there was no viable defence.

Meghan says publishing some of the five-page letter, which ran to 1,250 words, was a misuse of private information and breached her copyright.

The letter was penned after the duchess’s relationship with Markle broke down in the run-up to her glittering wedding to Prince Harry, the duke of Sussex, in May 2018, which her father missed due to ill health and after he admitted posing for paparazzi pictures.

rushbrooke told the court Meghan’s “intrinsically private, personal and sensitive letter” had been a plea to her father to stop talking to the press.

The paper published extracts in February the following year, and has justified its action by saying it allowed Markle to respond to interviews Meghan’s anonymous friends had given to the u.s. magazine People.

“It was a total lie. It misrepresented the tone and content of the letter Meg had written me,” Markle wrote in a witness statement, made public Tuesday, in which he said Meghan had either “expressly authorized” the People interviews or approved of them.

“It was only by publishing the text of the letter that I could properly set the record straight and show that what People magazine had published was false and unfair.”

Meghan’s lawyers told the court that publishing it was a “triple-barrelled” assault on “her private life, her family life and her correspondence.”

In its written defence, the paper said the duchess was willing for private matters to become public if it suited her, saying she had co-operated with a biography of the couple, and there were “inconsistent statements” she needed to explain.

The trial was due to start last week but was delayed until late 2021 at Meghan’s request last year. Her team also announced at the time they would seek a summary judgment.

If it goes ahead, it raises the prospect of Markle giving evidence in court against his daughter, whom he has not seen since they fell out, as well as appearances by the duchess herself.