UK’s Mail on Sunday Prints Front Page Mea Culpa After Meghan Markle’s Legal Victory, Publishers to Pay Her ‘Financial Remedies’

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The United Kingdom’s Mail on Sunday printed a statement on its front page admitting that Meghan Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, won her copyright claim against the paper’s publisher.

“The Duchess of Sussex wins her legal case for copyright infringement against Associated Newspapers for articles published in The Mail on Sunday and posted on Mail Online,” the front page notice stated.

The statement continued on page 3, revealing that the publishers will also pay Markle “financial remedies”:

Following a hearing on 19-20 January, 2021, and a further hearing on 5 May, 2021, the Court has given judgment for the Duchess of Sussex on her claim for copyright infringement. The Court found that Associated Newspapers infringed her copyright by publishing extracts of her handwritten letter to her father in The Mail on Sunday and on Mail Online. Financial remedies have been agreed.

The publication printed the mea culpa after a judge ordered that the paper had breached Markle’s privacy in February 2019.

Markle sued Mail on Sundays, which is a sister paper to the Daily Mail, for a copyright breach and invasion of privacy over their publication of a private letter to her father Thomas Markle — winning most of the claim.

High Court justice Mark Warby ruled the published letter was “personal and private,” ordering the to run the statement admitting that Duchess of Sussex won her copyright claim against the paper.

“The defendant devoted a very considerable amount of space to the infringing articles, which it continued to publish for over two years,” Warby said in the ruling. “It has devoted a very considerable number of further column inches, and many hundreds if not thousands of words, to coverage of earlier stages of this litigation and commentary upon them. The wording sought is modest by comparison and factual in nature.”

Warby further ruled that the Duchess had a “reasonable expectation that the contents of the letter would remain private.”