Meghan Markle Files Lawsuit After ‘Mail On Sunday’ Published A Private Letter She Wrote Her Father
Meghan Markle, with the support of Prince Harry, has decided to bring a lawsuit against British tabloid The Mail On Sunday after the paper published a personal letter between the duchess and her father Thomas Markle, The Guardian reports.
In light of his wife’s decision, Prince Harry released a statement regarding the lawsuit on the official website of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex. In it, he claimed that the newspaper had failed to do its duty with accurate and impartial reporting, and instead chose to target his wife with no thought to the consequences in her personal life.
He added that he felt as if Meghan was suffering the same way in which his mother, the late Princess Diana, did. Princess Diana was famously harassed by paparazzi and the media are considered partially to blame for the 1997 car crash which took her life.
Prince Harry also likened the negative press to “bullying” and said that it had the effect of dehumanizing people.
“There comes a point when the only thing to do is to stand up to this behavior, because it destroys people and destroys lives. Put simply, it is bullying, which scares and silences people. We all know this isn’t acceptable, at any level,” Prince Harry wrote.
“We won’t and can’t believe in a world where there is no accountability for this.”
“I’ve seen what happens when someone I love is commoditized to the point that they are no longer treated or seen as a real person,” he added.
“I lost my mother and now I watch my wife falling victim to the same powerful forces.”
The letter that was published by The Mail was written by Meghan in August 2018, shortly after the royal wedding. By that point, Meghan and her father, a former Hollywood lighting designer, were in a frosty place in their relationship, as he first was caught staging pictures for money and later missed the wedding due to alleged health complications.
Meghan acknowledged the rift in the missive, beginning by saying that her heart had been broken, but adding that she did not understand why Thomas Sr. had acted in certain ways. She refuted the claim that he had called her after his reported heart attack and also wrote that she had offered him much financial support in the past, despite his public negations on the matter. Ironically, she also begged her father not to share the letter to the media.
Though Thomas Sr. claimed that he had originally wanted to honor her wishes, he changed his mind after a series of interviews in People magazine by Meghan’s friends painted him in a bad light. The letter is still available to read via The Daily Mail.
The decision to take legal action comes in the midst of the Sussex’s tour in South Africa, where Meghan recently stunned in a belted tuxedo dress, as covered by The Inquisitr.
