Meghan Markle Wins Her U.K. Tabloid Lawsuit Against Associated Newspapers

From Harper's BAZAAR

Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, has won her long-standing High Court lawsuit against Associated Newspapers, the publisher of The Mail on Sunday and MailOnline.

A judge ruled in the duchess's favor in a summary judgment Thursday over the two media outlets publishing portions of a private letter she wrote to her father, Thomas Markle, ahead of her 2018 wedding to Prince Harry. Due to the ruling on the case, which Meghan's lawyers argued was a breach of copyright and misuse of private information, an additional trial regarding the lawsuit has been deemed unnecessary. BAZAAR.com can confirm that Meghan is seeking damages from the two outlets following the ruling in her favor.

“After two long years of pursuing litigation, I am grateful to the courts for holding Associated Newspapers and The Mail on Sunday to account for their illegal and dehumanizing practices. These tactics (and those of their sister publications MailOnline and the Daily Mail) are not new; in fact, they’ve been going on for far too long without consequence. For these outlets, it’s a game. For me and so many others, it’s real life, real relationships, and very real sadness. The damage they have done and continue to do runs deep,” said the duchess in a statement.

“The world needs reliable, fact-checked, high-quality news. What The Mail on Sunday and its partner publications do is the opposite. We all lose when misinformation sells more than truth, when moral exploitation sells more than decency, and when companies create their business model to profit from people’s pain,” she continued.

Meghan also expressed her gratitude toward the ruling and shared that in order for us all to live in a better world, truth in media and reporting must prevail.

“But for today, with this comprehensive win on both privacy and copyright, we have all won. We now know, and hope it creates legal precedent, that you cannot take somebody’s privacy and exploit it in a privacy case, as the defendant has blatantly done over the past two years,” Meghan said. “I share this victory with each of you—because we all deserve justice and truth, and we all deserve better. I particularly want to thank my husband, mom, and legal team, and especially Jenny Afia for her unrelenting support throughout this process.”

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