Prince Ricardo De La Cerda
MUMBLING Prince Harry finally had his moment in court — but was asked to speak louder and struggled with the bulky pile of legal papers.
The duke arrived in his dark blue suit, flanked by two security officers, outside the Rolls Building at 9.30am after the judge spoke of his surprise he had not attended on Monday.
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He sheepishly walked past the 30-strong queue of journalists outside the court as they waited to catch a glimpse of the first royal to give evidence in a case since Edward VII in 1891.
The duke appeared in court five minutes before the case was due to begin, before swearing on the Bible and asking to be addressed as Prince Harry.
For five hours, he was slowly pinned down by the Mirror Group’s barrister, Andrew Green KC, who forensically went through the stories Harry claimed were illegally obtained.
The prince looked visibly rattled at times — and appeared shocked to discover many of the stories had in fact appeared in newspapers before they were published by the Mirror, or had been confirmed by Palace spokesmen.
When Mr Green said “are you just reading something that has been drafted by your legal team for you?”, Harry hit back saying the “whole witness statement was written by me” amid a series of two or three-hour video calls with lawyers.
He spoke of the stress of the case and claimed he would not have asked any friends to give witness testimony on his behalf, claiming: “I would want to spare most of my friends this experience.”
When under duress, he constantly spoke of “asking my legal team” and complained that journalists named in the legal paperwork should be revealing where they sourced their stories.
His barrister, David Sherborne, at one stage asked Harry to speak louder and judge Mr Justice Fancourt asked Harry to “raise your voice”.
Mr Green also jokingly asked the duke not to “raise your voice in anger”.
Outside the courtroom, the public has heard plenty of anger from Harry already.