London — U.K. court documents emerged this week that include claims from Britain's Prince Harry that his brother and heir to the throne Prince William quietly received "a very large sum of money" in a 2020 phone hacking settlement with the U.K. newspaper division of Rupert Murdoch's media empire.
It was one of a series of explosive revelations made in witness statements from Harry's lawyer in arguments about why the younger prince's lawsuit against the publisher of The Sun and now-defunct News Of The World tabloids should not be thrown out. The court filings have raised questions about other possible secret deals between the royals and Britain's tabloid press.
A key allegation to emerge from both Harry's book "Spare" and he and his wife Meghan's interviews over the last few years is that members of his own family or their staff have been "enabling, if not outright collaborating" with Britain's tabloids, including in a "vicious campaign" to cast Meghan as a bully.
"There would definitely be, on Harry's side, the sense that there was a cosy cartel between the popular papers and the royal family," former editor of The Sun, Kelvin MacKenzie, told CBS News this week. "He wants to blow this up. He gets back at his own family. He bashes the tabloids over the head — gives Murdoch a kick in the pants — there is nothing not to like as far as Harry is concerned."
Buckingham Palace has not commented on the court case, in which Harry alleges that, since the mid-2000s, he's been the victim of phone hacking and other illegal behavior by tabloid journalists. The prince — who has lived in California with his family since they gave up their roles as senior "working" members of the royal family — claims reporters working for Murdoch's newspapers illegally accessed his voicemails to obtain private information on him.
The tactics, Harry argues, have generated headlines which have destroyed some of his personal relationships.
Over the past decade, Murdoch-owned businesses have settled hundreds of similar phone-hacking claims for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages, out of court.
"Rupert Murdoch never goes into the witness box," said MacKenzie. "He'll do everything, everything to stop either him or his other executives in London from being cross-questioned. It's a very, very big game that's going on in London."
Murdoch's News Group Newspapers has argued that a senior British judge should throw out hacking lawsuits brought by Harry and Hollywood star Hugh Grant, claiming they were brought too late, but the prince insists he was really prevented from bringing his case because of a "secret agreement" between other members of his own family under which there would instead be an apology and out-of-court settlement.
Harry claims in the court documents that the alleged deal was authorized by his late grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, and that it would have prevented any future lawsuits against the newspaper group by the royals.
Murdoch's News Group has denied any secret agreement with the royal family.
Tucker Reals is the CBSNews.com foreign editor, based at the CBS News London bureau.
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