The Duke of Sussex has claimed the tabloids want him to be single because it is more interesting and the “twisted objective” to ruin his relationships continues to this day, even though he is married.
Harry, who wed the Duchess of Sussex in 2018, said the newspapers were keen to try to break up his past relationships, and his current one with Meghan, by putting as much strain and distrust on them as humanly possible.
He said he had always tried to be the best partner he possibly could “but every woman has her limit”.
“Unfortunately, they are not just in a relationship with me but with the entire tabloid press as the third party,” the duke said.
He accused the press of trying to ruin every relationship he had ever had to sell more newspapers, and told how he and former girlfriend Chelsy Davy were “never on our own” and could never enjoy one another’s company away from the “prying eyes of the tabloids”.
Harry accused Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) of blagging the couple’s flight details and hotel bookings and/or intercepting their voicemails after journalists turned up while they holidayed on a small island off Mozambique.
The duke said their circle of friends became smaller and smaller and he found it hard to trust anyone which led to bouts of depression and paranoia.
“Ultimately, these factors led (Chelsy) to make the decision that a royal life was not for her, which was incredibly upsetting for me at the time,” the duke said.
The duke, in his witness statement as part of his individual case against MGN over alleged unlawful information gathering, said: “I always felt as if the tabloids wanted me to be single, as I was much more interesting to them and sold more newspapers.
“Whenever I got into a relationship, they were very keen to report the details but would then, very quickly, seek to try and break it up by putting as much strain on it and creating as much distrust as humanly possible… This twisted objective is still pursued to this day even though I’m now married.”
The duke added: “At no point did I have a girlfriend or a relationship with anyone without the tabloids getting involved and ultimately trying to ruin it using whatever unlawful means at their disposal.”
He said nowhere was “off limits” for the defendant’s newspapers.
Harry alleged how every time he was in a relationship or a rumoured relationship the “whole person’s family, and often their friends, would be dragged into the chaos and find themselves the subject of unlawful activity on the part of MGN”.
He added: “That’s horrible for anyone.”
The duke revealed one of his former girlfriends said she was warned off by her parents who asked: “Is it really worth all the aggravation?” Harry said that their relationship ended shortly afterwards.
Harry also described a 2007 story in The People about his then-girlfriend Ms Davy’s fears for his safety over his proposed military deployment to Iraq as “so violating”.
He said he believed journalists had listened to his and Ms Davy’s private messages, saying: “This article once more shows it’s not my career and professional life that the defendant’s journalists were interested in, but very private, raw emotions between me and my partner.”
His statement also showed that the duke promised Ms Davy he was not given a lap dance at the Spearmint Rhino club in 2006.
Referring to a story in The People which said Ms Davy had gone “berserk” and slammed the phone down on Harry over the night out, the duke said: “I don’t think Chelsy did go mad about me going there.
“We did speak about it over the phone, but I promised her that I hadn’t had a lap dance and stayed with the three other cadets that had girlfriends.”
The duke said he believed journalists had access to one of their phone records and “put two and two together to make a story”.
The duke is suing MGN for damages, claiming journalists at its titles, which also include the Sunday Mirror and Sunday People, were linked to methods including phone hacking, so-called “blagging” or gaining information by deception, and use of private investigators for unlawful activities.
MGN is contesting the claims and has either denied or not admitted each of them.
