Media Rupert Murdoch secretly compensated Prince William with a very large sum of money to discreetly settle a wiretapping lawsuit, according to new court records cited by the Guardian.

In 2020, the Prince of Wales received an undisclosed amount of compensation after he sued the owner of Sun and News of the World.

Details of the settlement were given in legal documents filed by his brother, Prince Harry, as part of his own legal battle with the publisher, which is ongoing in the High Court today.

Harry testified in court that attempts to get an apology from Murdoch’s company for wiretapping were approved by his grandmother, the late Queen Elizabeth II.

Harry referred to a secret deal made between the royal family and “senior executives” of Murdoch’s company prior to 2012. Under the proposed deal, the princes deferred legal action against the newspaper group and received an apology from the group in return.

Harry said the royal family made the deal after being hit by the Tampongate affair when the Sun received a recording of a phone conversation between Prince Charles and Camilla while the couple were in a relationship in the 1980s.

Murdoch’s media empire wants to avoid another high-profile court case just weeks after it paid more than $700 million to settle a US libel case against Fox News.

If Harry wins this week’s hearing against Murdoch’s company, he is expected to seek more than £200,000 in damages.

Lawyers for the royal family noted in court that News UK has been engaged in “deliberate cover-ups, destruction of evidence, cover-ups and false denials even under oath” for years.

Source: Guardian