Meghan Markle's Tabloid Privacy Case Could Be Over in Just Two Days

Meghan Markle hopes to see her tabloid privacy case end in emphatic victory next week after just two days of hearings and no live testimony.

The Duchess of Sussex launched her lawsuit in a hail of publicity in October 2019 alongside a public statement from Prince Harry alleging bullying by the tabloid press.

He announced that the publication of a letter Meghan sent her father in which she accused him of lying would form the basis of the case, but said it was "one incident in a long and disturbing pattern."

Since then, the lawsuit has seen Meghan forced to remove claims of an agenda against her, left personally asking the court not to name five friends and conceding she authorized a person to give material to the authors of a tell-all biography.

If it goes to trial, the duchess and her father will both likely give evidence under oath about how they fell out in the run-up to her wedding.

However, that could all be avoided next week if Meghan wins a two-day hearing starting on Tuesday in which she will try to convince the court to award her victory without a trial.

The Hearing

Meghan's lawyers have applied for a "summary judgment" that, if successful, would end the case without the need for a trial—and therefore without her giving evidence.

Her legal team will need to demonstrate her case is so strong that she wins even if the Mail on Sunday proves all its factual claims.

In November, Mark Stephens, a U.K.-based attorney at Howard Kennedy, told Newsweek: "Her application is hopeless and hapless. That'll fail.

"She's put herself in this position where she has to accept every fact that The Mail on Sunday is saying are true.

"Only if everything they're saying is true and they still lose can she do it."

The newspaper's defense alleges that Meghan wrote the letter with the intention of it being made public as part of a media strategy agreed with Kensington Palace.

They say their story was part of Thomas Markle's right to freedom of expression after an article in People in which Meghan's friends criticized him and referred to the letter.

The duchess can only win the privacy part of her case if her attorney can convince judge Mark Warby none of that removes her right to privacy.

Meghan has also sued for copyright infringement after significant extracts of the handwritten note were printed in The Mail on Sunday.

The document was copied out by hand from an electronic draft and the newspaper claims a press officer wrote sections, meaning Meghan is not the sole copyright holder and cannot sue without the involvement of the royal family's PR.

A November court filing claims former press secretary Jason Knauf "and/or others in the Kensington Palace communications team contributed to the writing of the letter."

Meghan and Prince Harry will not be in court due to COVID and so will have to follow as best they can from California, though the time difference means much of what takes place will happen overnight for them.

The Stakes

If Meghan is unsuccessful, she will not only have to give evidence in court and face questioning by the newspaper's lawyers, she will also see her father give evidence against her either in person or in written form.

Lawyers for The Mail on Sunday will also push for further evidence to be disclosed by not only Meghan but also the five friends who defended her to People.

They have already asked the court for permission to pursue the friends for evidence through the court system in America and a decision will be made if the trial is to go ahead.

Tim Luckhurst, principal of South College at Durham University, recently told Newsweek: "The best advice to Meghan all along has been to settle this as quickly as she possibly can.

"I don't think Meghan has ever really understood just how forensically she will be questioned in court.

"And the extent to which she will face a barrage of precisely the kind of intrusion that she most dislikes in circumstances where she cannot avoid it."

Luckhurst is a former newspaper editor and set up the Center for Journalism at the University of Kent.