Meghan Markle: Court of Appeal challenge by publisher of the Mail on Sunday begins over letter

Meghan Markle
Meghan Markle
TOBY MELVILLE
Gareth Milner

By Gareth Milner


Published: 09/11/2021

- 11:46

Updated: 09/11/2021

- 11:55

Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) is challenging a ruling earlier this year that its publication of Meghan’s letter was 'manifestly excessive and hence unlawful'.

The Court of Appeal challenge by the publisher of the Mail on Sunday over a letter sent by the Duchess of Sussex to her father has begun at the Royal Courts of Justice.

Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) is challenging a ruling earlier this year that its publication of Meghan’s letter was “manifestly excessive and hence unlawful”.


At the start of the case on Tuesday, the publisher argued the letter “was written with public consumption in mind as a possibility”.

Andrew Caldecott QC, for ANL, told the court: “We read the judgment as implicitly accepting that the letter was crafted as an intimate communication for her father’s eyes only.

“The fundamental point turns out to be false on the new evidence. The letter was crafted specifically with the potential of public consumption in mind because the claimant appreciated Mr Markle might disclose it to the media.”

Mr Caldecott added that Meghan “made no effort to correct” an article in People magazine in the US, which featured an interview with five friends of the Duchess of Sussex, adding that Mr Markle had “considered the article to be a serious attack on him”.

Andrew Caldecott QC has said that ANL’s defence to the Duchess of Sussex’s privacy claim was arguable and should have gone to a trial.

He told the Court of Appeal that Meghan’s claim was “diminished and outweighed” by her father’s right to reply following “false or misleading” allegations published in People magazine in the US.

He said: “The claimant’s letter and the People article both make allegations against Mr Markle of cruelly cold-shouldering the claimant in the pre-wedding period… The article, or its gist, was reported worldwide.”

The barrister added: “We say there was a difference between what Mr Markle said and what he was presented as saying.”

He concluded: “The defendant submits it has a strongly arguable case that by the time of the publication of the articles, the claimant no longer had a reasonable expectation of privacy of the text of the letter.”

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