Prince Harry and other celebrities have launched a Court of Appeal bid against a newspaper group after a judge ruled Daily Mail journalists did not tap their phones.
The Duke of Sussex, along with Baroness Doreen Lawrence and Sir Elton John, sued Associated Newspapers Limited (ANL) over allegations of unlawful information-gathering.
But a judge dismissed all their claims and ordered the group to pay the newspaper £9,544,355 in an interim payment while full costs are assessed.
Prince Harry later described the trial as a ‘whitewash’.
A spokesperson for Harry, Lady Lawrence, Sir Elton, his husband David Furnish and actresses Liz Hurley and Sadie Frost said: ‘We confirm that the claimants have today filed applications with the Court of Appeal for permission to appeal the judgments of Mr Justice Nicklin in respect of his dismissal of their claims and the indemnity costs order.
Sign up for all of the latest stories
Start your day informed with Metro’s News Updates newsletter or get Breaking News alerts the moment it happens.
‘The claimants respectfully disagree with those unprecedented decisions, which they consider to be legally and factually flawed.’
Court staff also confirmed on Friday that a bid to appeal against the rulings had been filed at the Court of Appeal.
Barristers for the group had alleged at trial that private investigators, freelance journalists and staff at ANL carried out acts including voicemail interception, landline tapping and obtaining information by deception – also known as ‘blagging’.
But lawyers for the publisher said that Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday journalists provided a ‘compelling account of a pattern of legitimate sourcing of articles’.
This includes friends and ‘leaky’ social circles, press officers and spokespeople, as well as previous reporting, freelance journalists and stories from other newspapers and news agencies.
Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at webnews@usnewsrank.com.
For more stories like this, check our news page.