Updated January 22, 2025 at 19:20 PM ET
LONDON — Prince Harry and a senior British lawmaker have agreed to settle with Rupert Murdoch's British publishing arm, fulfilling their quest for a full-fledged apology in the years-long struggle to hold the Murdoch tabloids here accountable for illegal privacy invasions and an alleged coverup of crimes.
Murdoch's British newspaper wing, News UK, offered a "full and unequivocal apology" to Harry for what it admitted were unlawful intrusions on his privacy from 1996 to 2011, for the strain it put on his family, and even for its actions toward his mother, the late Princess Diana.
It acknowledged "phone hacking, surveillance and misuse of private information by journalists and private investigators instructed by them at the News of the World." It further admitted "incidents of unlawful activities carried out by private investigators working for The Sun."
"After endless resistance, denials and legal battles ... to prevent the full picture from coming out, News UK is finally held to account for its illegal actions and its blatant disregard for the law," David Sherborne, the lead attorney for Prince Harry and former Member of Parliament Tom Watson, said outside the courthouse shortly after the settlement was announced.
Wednesday's statement is the first admission by Murdoch's corporate empire of wrongdoing by The Sun, which expanded to seven days when he closed the News of the World at the height of the phone hacking scandal in July 2011.
News UK's statement contradicts CEO's earlier claim
News UK chief executive Rebekah Brooks, who had previously run the News of the World and The Sun, resigned that month. A few days later, she testified that The Sun had been uncorrupted by the kind of illegal activity found at News of the World. " I was then editor of The Sun, and I can say absolutely that The Sun is a very clean ship, a great newsroom."
She returned to run News UK once more after being acquitted of hacking-related criminal charges. News UK's statement today undercuts her statement to Parliament in 2011 about The Sun.
Together, the two British tabloids, which the Australian-born Murdoch bought more than a half-century ago, served as the economic launch pad for the expansion of a global media empire, including his rise in the U.S.
In addition to News UK's apology to Harry, the company offered an apology to Watson, a senior Labour Party leader who is now a member of the House of Lords, for surveilling him from 2009 to 2011, when he was investigating the Murdoch tabloids for Parliament.
A personal reflection from a former Member of Parliament
At a press conference on Wednesday, Watson spoke poignantly as he addressed his former wife, saying he regretted the burden the tabloid's attention had placed on their family's life. He also spoke of others who had been targets of tabloid hacking, which included the royals, politicians and celebrities but also the victims of terrorism and crime, as well as war dead.
"At least we know now that ...victims and their loved ones are unlikely to have their phones hacked or their medical records stolen by tabloid newspapers as routinely used to happen," he said.
News UK had paid more than $1.5 billion to settle more than 1,300 complaints of people alleging phone hacking or other criminal intrusions of their privacy. Those settlements did not include analogous admissions or disclosures.
The settlement was announced just before opening arguments began in a trial slated to last at least six weeks. The timing was reminiscent of Murdoch's decision two years ago to pay $787.5 million to settle a defamation suit brought by a voting technology company against Fox News for broadcasting lies about the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Murdoch's team made the offer on the cusp of trial then, too. In that case, Fox made a modest admission that incorrect claims had been made, but the size of the settlement and its public disclosure were the more telling concessions.
A staggering sum for the U.K., though minor for U.S.
Here, the agreement included an eight-figure payment to Harry and Watson, covering damages and their legal fees, according to two people with knowledge of events. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about events.
Neither News UK nor Harry and Watson's legal team responded to NPR's request for comment on the size of the payments. By American standards, the sum is not a huge amount for this sort of court case. In the UK, it's considered staggering.
British law exerts pressure on plaintiffs to reach a settlement. They can be forced to pay the defendant's legal costs if they reject a settlement offer that exceeds the amount of the judgment awarded at trial.
In a related case involving the rival Mirror, the same presiding judge, Justice Timothy Fancourt, ruled that tabloid had hacked into Harry's voice mail messages, and that editors including Piers Morgan had known about it.
In the News UK case, the two claimants had deflected earlier appeals by News UK for a settlement, seeking instead to provide what Harry called "truth and accountability" in public for others who had settled. The two men also sought to give their legal team the ability to present publicly newly secured evidence to make the case that top executives destroyed millions of emails and hid evidence during the height of a phone hacking scandal here more than a decade ago.
Once News UK had conceded so much of their case, little legal ground remained to pursue at trial.
'Washington Post' publisher Will Lewis denies destroying emails
Among those News UK executives at the core of those allegations is Will Lewis, now CEO and publisher of The Washington Post. He was not a defendant in the case, and has denied all wrongdoing. Due to the settlement, claims against Lewis and the other executives have not been tested in court. A spokeswoman for Lewis declined comment on the settlement. News UK has vigorously denied any destruction of evidence or deception of police.
Top company executives, including Lewis, had told the police that they had deleted millions of emails of senior executives because they believed Watson and former Prime Minister Gordon Brown were trying to get confidential information to use in inquiries about the company.
News UK now admits that was incorrect.
"In 2011 News International received information that information was being passed covertly to Lord Watson from within News International. We now understand that this information was false, and Lord Watson was not in receipt of any such confidential information," the statement said.
The next year, Lewis became a senior executive at Murdoch's global News Corp. headquarters in New York City. He then led Murdoch's Wall Street Journal for six years.
Last summer, Brown pushed for Scotland Yard to open a full-fledged criminal investigation over the question of a coverup and destruction of evidence.
To date, an elite unit of Scotland Yard investigators has opened a preliminary review based on Brown's call but has not initiated a wider investigation.
Standing outside the courthouse, just a few blocks from the Murdoch tabloids' historic home on Fleet Street, Sherborne said the two papers unlawfully engaged more than 100 private investigators more than 35,000 times. He noted that such unlawful acts had been repeatedly denied by the company's executives during formal investigations - by including Brooks.
"The rule of law must now run its full course," Sherborne said this morning. "Prince Harry and Tom Watson join others in calling for the police and Parliament to investigate not only the unlawful activity now finally admitted, but the perjury and cover ups along the way."
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