Royally unbothered? Prince Harry was all smiles leaving court after his second day of testifying in his phone hacking trial.
The Duke of Sussex, 38, waved to reporters and cameras dressed in a navy suit and gray tie while walking out of London’s High Court on Wednesday, June 7. The prince’s lawsuit against the Mirror Group Newspapers went to trial on Monday, June 5, with Harry taking the stand for the first time on Tuesday, June 6.
During his second day of testifying, the BetterUp CIO discussed his past relationship with Caroline Flack, who died by suicide in 2020. In a written statement, Harry expressed his belief that the press engaged in voicemail hacking to discover that he was having a poker night in 2009 — which he invited Flack to attend — at his friend Mark Dyer’s apartment.
“Marko and I had exchanged voicemails about the night we had planned, and given the way I left, there’s no way I could have been followed coming down from Lincolnshire. Only Marko, Caroline and I knew of the plans, there was only a couple of other people invited and I don’t think they knew that Caroline would be joining us,” he wrote in the statement, noting that he became “highly suspicious” and “convinced” that someone had leaked information to the press.
The Archewell cofounder — who relocated to the United States in 2020 after he and wife Meghan Markle stepped down from their roles as senior royals — admitted that he started to doubt Flack and Dyer. He and his brother, Prince William, “stopped talking” to Dyer “for a while” as a result.
“I now believe this information had come from our voicemails — mine, Marko’s or Caroline’s. The impact these kinds of stories had on my relationships cannot be underestimated. Even those I trusted the most, I ended up doubting,” he shared.
Harry and the late Strictly Come Dancing alum were briefly linked in 2009, although the former military pilot wrote in Spare that they never seriously dated due to media attention.
“I continued to see Flack on and off, but we didn’t feel free anymore. We kept on, I think, because we genuinely enjoy each other’s company, and because we didn’t want to admit defeat at the hands of these arseholes,” he penned in the January 2023 memoir, referring to the aftermath of the poker night photos. “But the relationship was tainted, irredeemably, and in time we realized it just wasn’t worth the grief and harassment. Especially for her family. Goodbye, we said. Goodbye and good luck.”
The duke, who shares son Archie, 4, and daughter Lilibet, 2, with Meghan, 41, is the first British royal to testify in court in over 100 years. Though he was not present for the trial’s opening statements on Monday — his lawyer David Sherborne said he was traveling after celebrating Lilibet’s 2nd birthday — Harry testified in court on Tuesday.
During his first day on the stand, the Eton College alum opened up about his relationship with Chelsy Davy, whom he dated on and off from 2004 to 2010. In his written witness statement, Harry blamed press intrusion for his split from the Zimbabwe native, 37, claiming that unwanted media attention led Davy to conclude that “a royal life was not for her.”
Despite recounting memories of heartbreak, the former senior royal reportedly ended his first day in court with a cheeky joke. After being instructed not to share any evidence from the trial when he returns home to his family in California, Harry responded by asking if the rule applied to his children, as he might be connecting with them via FaceTime, per Newsweek.
