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The Duchess of Sussex has admitted that she provided personal information to the authors of a royal biography through a third party who knew its authors had approached.
In the latest round of documents filed with the Superior Court, Meghan’s attorneys reveal that she was concerned about her father’s narrative in the media that she had ‘abandoned’ him and ‘had not even tried to contact him (which was false). it would be repeated. .
Meghan’s attorneys add: “ Consequently, it indicated to a person who knew that the authors had already addressed that the true above position (that that person and several others who knew the Plaintiff already knew about) could be communicated to the authors to avoid any additional misrepresentation. ‘
Meghan insists on the document, however, she does not know to what extent the information was shared.
His lawyers add: “He does not know to what extent or on what terms this information regarding his communications with his father was shared with the authors.”
The 39-year-old Duchess of Sussex admitted in documents filed in Superior Court that she provided personal information to the Finding Freedom authors through a third party. In the photo: Meghan signs a guest book in 2018
Meghan’s legal team also says they do not know if the Kensington Palace Communications team contacted the authors of Finding Freedom on her behalf.
The latest court filings from Meghan’s legal team are in response to an earlier court ruling that allowed the Mail On Sunday to rely on the royal biography Finding Freedom as part of its case, claiming that it cooperated with its authors and allowed excerpts from a letter written to his separated father, to be published in it.
Meghan, 39, is suing Associated Newspapers, publishers of Mail On Sunday and MailOnline for privacy violation for publishing excerpts from a letter she sent to her father Thomas Markle after their royal wedding in 2018.
Details on how the letter came about were contained in court documents presented to the London High Court by Meghan’s lawyers on Monday.
Meghan is suing The Mail on Sunday for publishing excerpts from the note, which she says violated her privacy. He also claims that the newspaper infringed on his copyright in the handwritten letter, sent to his father Thomas Markle (pictured together) after he was unable to attend the 2018 royal wedding.
Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex and his wife Meghan, Duchess of Sussex greet from the Ascot Landau carriage as they make their way to Windsor Castle on May 19, 2018, following their wedding.
The Duchess of Sussex says in documents filed in High Court that a senior Kensington Palace press official was involved in “providing general ideas to a private letter” she wrote to her estranged father.
Meghan says she decided to write the letter to Thomas Markle on the advice of two senior members of the Royal Family in an attempt to get him to stop talking to the press.
Jason Knauf (pictured), who was communications secretary to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, ‘and / or others on the Kensington Palace communications team contributed to the drafting of the letter, ” the newspaper’s lawyers told the newspaper. Supreme Court
They claim that he spent several weeks taking notes on his iPhone and many hours writing a draft of the letter and then consulted Jason Knauf, who was Secretary of Communications to the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
The document adds: ‘She shared a draft of that draft with her husband and Mr. Knauf for support, as this was a deeply painful process that they went through with her … In the course of a discussion between them, the Mr. Knauf provided comments on that draft but no actual wording, as it was a personal letter from the daughter to the father.
Meghan’s lawyers add: “The comments that Mr. Knauf provided were in the form of ‘big ideas’ rather than actual words. For the avoidance of doubt, neither Mr. Knauf (nor anyone else) created any part of the electronic draft of the letter.
“Plaintiff (Meghan) and Plaintiff alone created the Electronic Draft, which she then hand-transcribed to her father as the Letter.”
The alleged role of officials from the Kensington Palace communications team has become one of the key issues in the case.
Earlier this week, court documents filed by the newspaper’s lawyers claimed that Mr. Knauf and others on the team contributed to the writing of the letter and that as a result, it was not Meghan’s ‘own intellectual creation’.
The newspaper also alleges that Meghan wrote the letter knowing it was going to be made public and that she used it as part of a ‘broader strategy’, which she has also denied in her reformed response.
Meghan and her 76-year-old father will face each other in Superior Court within a year if the trial continues.
The case of the newspaper is that Mr. Markle (in the photo with Meghan) asked him to publish excerpts of the letter, to make things clear, because a few days before his daughter’s friends had revealed her existence, and described her wrongly like a ‘love’ letter. in an anonymous interview they granted the American magazine People
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex leave the Commonwealth Service at Westminster Abbey in London on March 9 this year, in their final royal engagement before leaving royal life.
The trial was due to start on January 11, but last month Meghan won a nine-month delay after asking Judge Warby for a postponement for a ‘confidential’ reason.
Meghan’s lawyers deny that she provided a copy of the letter to her father for the royal Finding Freedom biography or that she cooperated with them in any way.
As part of his case, the newspaper also states that Mr. Markle asked him to publish excerpts of the letter, to clarify things, because a few days before his daughter’s friends had revealed his existence in an anonymous interview they gave to the magazine American People, who felt he had wrongly characterized it as a “love” letter.
The trial was due to start on January 11, but last month Meghan won a nine-month delay after asking Judge Warby (pictured) for a postponement for a ‘confidential’ reason.
Court artist sketch of Judge Warby (bottom left) Antony White QC (bottom right), for ANL and Meghan’s attorney, David Sherborne, during a virtual hearing in Superior Court on 24 April.
Thomas Markle displays a keepsake on Harry and Meghan’s mantelpiece from their missed wedding during their Channel 5 documentary in January this year.
In their response, Meghan’s legal team stated that she did not know about the interview and did not know that they would make references to the letter.
She adds that the decision to speak to People magazine was the result of her close circle of friends’ concern about the impact that the ‘aggressive attacks’ from the media were having on her and that they wanted to portray what she was’ really’ like. .
Meghan’s response also says that Markle had already said before being admitted to the hospital for heart problems that he would not attend her wedding after being “ publicly embarrassed ” for taking paparazzi photographs.
