I have no idea if Prince Harry likes to curse, but I imagine him dropping some well-justified f-bombs all over the place every so often. As this story broke, I have an image of him telling Meghan, “They’re going to be sorry they ever f–ked with us.” And it’s true. Chickens are coming home to roost. Many gossip bloggers, including Lainey at LaineyGossip and yours truly, have pointed out that Dan Wootton at The Sun has gotten some very suspicious leaks from Kensington Palace over the past 14 months especially. Wootton was the one to break the story about Sussexit back in January of this year, by far THE biggest royal story of the year, and one he suspiciously had an inside track on, albeit an inside track which “massaged” the story more in favor of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge’s narrative at the time. More recently, I spoke about my surprise that Wootton had not done much about Kate’s Tatler debacle – he only wrote about it for the first time late last week, and it was a lukewarm criticism about classism re: Carole Middleton.
You get the idea. Wootton has had a steady stream of exclusives, many of which are mostly true, or true-with-a-Keen streak. We also knew that Wootton had some kind of connection to high-level staffers in Kensington Palace’s communications office, namely Christian Jones. Why all of this Wootton talk now? Because Prince Harry’s lawsuit against the Sun has uncovered ALL of the shenanigans about Wootton. Byline Investigates ran a bombshell report, which you can read here. It’s long, but I’ll try to summarize the broad strokes:
Dan Wootton and The Sun are threatening Byline Investigates for this story: They sent a formal “Letter Before Action” threat to the site because of this story.
The connection between Wootton and KP: There is a “close connection between Mr Wootton and the Sussexes’ former Communications Secretary Christian Jones, who continues to be employed in the role by Prince William and Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and whose partner is freelance publicist Callum Stephens, who is also a friend to Wootton.”
Wootton allegedly paid Callum Stephens for info: “Sources close to the matter say it is alleged The Sun made two payments amounting to £4,000 to Stephens, in relation to stories published in June and July 2019 about nannying and god-parenting arrangements for the Sussexes’ son Archie, and that the payments appear to have been identified by way of an internal News UK accounting code.”
It’s through these payouts that Wootton got info about Sussexit: “Confidential details of the Sussexes’ move to Canada were also revealed in an unauthorised fashion and then published in the Sun on Sunday in January under Wootton’s name, according to three sources with knowledge of the case…There is no suggestion the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge had any knowledge at the time of unauthorised briefings to the Press.”
Wootton is being protected for now: “Wootton says he is prepared to defend his position in court and that he will prove his professional integrity if need be, and claims to enjoy the full confidence of The Sun, whose editor-in-chief Victoria Newton has coincidentally been named as a suspected phone hacker in an unrelated court case that Prince Harry is bringing against the tabloid. Both Wootton and News UK have said they will sue Byline Investigates immediately for writing this story.
Who is Callum Stephens? “Jones’s partner, Callum Stephens, is a freelance publicist involved in the management of stars from tragedy-stricken ITV2 show Love Island, and whose previous clients include The Weinstein Company, model Naomi Campbell, presenter Emma Willis, and Olympic diver Tom Daley. He was Jones’ partner at the “material times”, which are said to have begun in June 2019 and continued in 2020. Contrary to reports, the Sussexes had no part in the 2019 hiring of Wootton’s friend Christian Jones to handle their media relations during the Duchess’s pregnancy – an appointment recorded at the time by The Sun in an unusual article praising the “hottie” new PR man as “hunky”, “handsome” and “cute”.
So, BI says that Prince Harry now believes – and Harry is making this part of his larger lawsuit – that Wootton used his friendships with Christian Jones and Callum Stephens to work out a scheme where he paid Stephens for information – given by Jones, who still works for Kensington Palace – about the Sussexes. And only the Sussexes? That’s what I don’t get – Christian Jones clearly works for the Cambridges and he would obviously have *more* information on Will and Kate. So why were all of the exclusives about Meghan and Harry? Sounds like Willileaks has already found his patsy, his scapegoat. Don’t get me wrong, I definitely think the Wootton-Jones-Stephens connection needs to be explored in greater detail. But it feels like Wootton and Prince William were both showing their hands because of the LACK of tea about the Cambridges in Wootton’s reporting post-Rose Hanbury. I’m just saying.
Photos courtesy of Getty, WENN, Avalon Red and Backgrid.
Another Cambridge staffer Jason Knauf went to school with Wooton.
It’s very telling that when Sussexit leaked to the press there was no official investigation on the part of the palace to find out how or why. It would be a major security risk having someone leaking such sensitive information. But of course if you’re the one providing the info and authorizing the leaks then there would be no security concerns.
This right here. Wootton’s exclusive in January about Harry and Meghan leaving was a huge leak of information and in any functioning business there would have been an investigation of where the leak happened and then penalties applied, likely termination.
There is no way the publicist boyfriend finds out about Sussexit without Jones telling tales and that would normally be enough of a breach of confidentiality in any other organization to get Jones fired. But six months later Jones is still there. And there is no way he’s still there unless his leaks were approved by someone and with the direction the information has been flowing, it’s pretty obvious the Cambridges had no issue with the leaks. This despite William claiming privacy at all other times. But somehow having your head of communications leak directly or indirectly one of the biggest stories about the royals in years is no big deal to him.
Spot on Nic. Byline reported that Christian Jones had denied any knowledge of involvement. But in any normal situation it being discovered that your partner has been paid for confidential work information would warrant an investigation and likely disciplinary action. Will be interesting to see explanations for how Callum came to know sensitive information about Christian’s workplace if not through him.
Im so curious who the whistleblower is.
Harry is at pre legal action stage on this issue but it’s curious how the U.K. press censors itself. The partner of a palace employee allegedly being paid for and passing on confidential stories to a newspaper is the kind of pillow talk gossip scandal they normally live for.
I was talking to someone in a group chat and they were wondering why Harry didn’t say it was Will and Kate. I told her that Harry was indirectly saying it was. Either way this looks bad for Will and Kate. Either they knew and were fine with it and giving them info for Wotten or they are the most incompetent bosses out there that don’t know what goes on in their palace. Will and Kate are screwed either way.
@ginger – I agree. IF, by some miracle, Will and Kate did not give the “ok” for the information to be leaked, OR by another miracle had no clue this was happening right in front of their noses, then they are completely incompetent. Neither is a good look for them. (meaning its not a good look to have authorized these leaks, and its not a good look to have no idea what was going on.)
and I’m going to really go out on a limb here and say they 100% knew, because even IF (and again by some miracle) they did NOT know at the time of the leaks that it was Jones – Stephens – Wootton, then Harry made damn sure they did know at some point.
And yet Jones is still there.
Yeah, and at the time I think that aspect of it flew under the radar for many, because the story itself was so big.
But Wootton got his story from somewhere and while many of us have long said it was Jones, its very telling that Jones is still there.
Yes the story was big and we the outsiders forgot that key aspect ,but one would think the players would have enquired into how it got out . It just got to show the leaks were authorise by a senior member and their enquiries if they did one showed that
The thing, too, as I recall … the Palace meeting to discuss the particulars of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex ‘stepping down’ with Harry were confidential and only involved Queen Elizabeth, Prince Charles, Prince Harry, and Prince William. I distinctly recall Harry balking at revealing specific details about his and Meghan’s exit in a meeting because he was convinced it would leak, and the Royal trio, particularly William, insisting upon him doing so.
Then the news leaked and the Sussexes were accused of being fame-hungry wh$res for releasing the news for attention and to stick the finger of their ‘rudness’ in the Royals’ faces … especially the Queen.
The question is, and I’m sure it will be asked by the Tatler crowd as well, how did the Kensington Palace Communication Secretary learn details about the Sussexes exit that were only discussed in a private meeting with Queen Elizabeth, Prince Charles, Prince Harry, and Prince William?
@yvette, aides were also in on the meetings. William brought at least one, I think Case that is now back working for BJ. Charles brought his aide, I think, that was “liking” tweets bashing Meghan. The Sussexes brought a private secretary and I am not sure who represented the queen. Probably the same guy that put roadblocks up so Harry could not meet timely with the queen
@Mary, did William bring his Communications Secretary?
The Queen, Prince Charles, William and Harry each brought private secretaries, respectively, Sir Edward Young, Clive Alderton, Simon Case and Fiona Mcilwham. Other reports say that other people were involved in the negotiations as well. E.g., per the Guardian, a gov. Cabinet Secretary Sir Mark Sedwick was also present. At some point I recall Gove was involved as Lancaster Chancellor and Priti Patel was brought in later regarding whether or not their security would continue. I don’t recall seeing anything saying that Jones was personally involved in the preliminary stages but with so many people involved, I am sure KP was abuzz with all the goings-on.
I think, at the time, the speculation wasn’t so much that it was Christian Jones, but rather that it was William who prompted one of his staffers to speak to Wootton, leaked the news to Wootton himself, or that it was Carole who either took up the initiative or was tasked with being the go-between. But the majority of the guessing was that it was either William, or someone at KP acting on William’s behalf.
KP is total amateur hour. A full on clown car.The fact this guy can be bought for a measly $4k shows how weak their staff is. They let their jealousy get in the way of integrity and professionalism. Sure to some it’s no big deal because it’s the Sussexes but what if it was a more nefarious actor like Russian intelligence with a bigger cash payment? What would he do for $50k? This is disgraceful and should be exposed and investigated. No wonder the Sussexes got the hell out of there.
I think you all are talking about the “Sandringham Summit” which happened AFTER Sussexit leaked and after the Sussexes released their plan.
I don’t recall hearing about a big meeting BEFORE the news leaked which was part of the problem. Harry couldn’t get the meeting he so desperately wanted.
Yes, but it stands to reason that, at the very least, the aforementioned aides were aware of Harry’s written memo that he was loathe to put in writing for fear of leaks from staff or Royals themselves.
Let’s be honest here, the senior Royals probably would not be acting on their own in considering the Sussexes’ plan to prepare for the meeting (not smart enough and/or too lazy).
If the aides showed up to the meeting you can bet that they were apprised of the plan beforehand and from the outset.
With being such egomaniacs and reckless as all the royals are I’m sure Russian intelligence has long had sources riddled throughout this monarchy for decades.
I mean if newspapers can hack and get phones tapes of them so easily, a professional intelligence service must just have their way with gathering any intel at will from the Windsors.
That ship has long since sailed.
@Mary – yes, of course some very high level aides knew what was going on, especially since those aides were blocking Harry’s efforts to talk to his grandmother. My point was that the above speculation seems premised on the idea that there was a confidential meeting attended by the Queen etc and the details of that leaked, and that’s not quite what happened.
I honestly feel like Jason K. is the main proxy leaker for the Cambridges, but he does it for “free” as part of his job functions so it will be harder to prove. All other leaks and smears were by him.
Thing is, like you say, this isn’t the only leak Wootton has had. He’s also revealed Bea’s wedding location and Peter and Autumn’s divorce. Even if you chalked the leaks about the Sussexes plan as a “lucky guess” (it wasn’t because the story was pretty accurate), why didn’t alarm bells go ringing when the same person got two other leaks. Once is an incident, twice is a coincidence but thrice is a pattern.
Did no one at KP/BP/CH think “Wow. Wonder how the sun got so lucky?!?!?” Like I said, did alarm bells not ring? Did no one decide to investigate and launch an official inquiry? Because if the plans of senior royals can be leaked like that, then that’s a major security concern.
So either the royals are negligent and incompetent or they were in on it. Either way, they look bad.
As for Jones, like I said yesterday, they’ll fire him but give him a nice severance package like they did with Andrew’s Private Secretary after the newsnight interview.
That would have worked earlier before this story , now if they fire him it would prove they knew or authorise that leaks and are just covering their tracks . That story was huge and for it to be leaked to the media meant there were holes in their operations and if the so called firm didn’t enquire how it got out then it clearly meant the leaks were authorise by a senior member
Penis with teeth and Karen Buttons must be really daft to trust the blabber mouth dan the stalking wooton. And Jones threw his partner under the bus so the kp residents must be shaking cos it will take little for Jones to name them too.
But seriously these people are the worst , there are too many ways u can PR without backstabbing others. Harry learnt this earlier on and now he is free to demand and say no to the media monsters. Same cant be said for the kp dwellers , they have so many skeletons hidden by the media they own them now and pics of the kiddies wont always work
So this is why the Tatler nonsense with blaming Meghan ended so suddenly. This is why the reporters have been praising the Sussexes, particularly Meghan this past week. It wasn’t only because of BLM and money, it was because they see that the other shoe is about to. drop. This is why Tatler was so comfortable without that article about Kate because everyone knows in that press that Kate is a jealous mean girl who was jealous of her sister in law and the Cambridge’s jumped in with the press because they needed to also cover up the affair. I’m so proud of Harry and Meghan because both are really exposing that horrid press and family. The Cambridge’s are fools to think that this wouldn’t come back to them or the media won’t turn on them.
Harry is done with them and it shows , they better stop now cos of they push that man far ,he will burn all the bridges to safe his family. He should be the one they should be afraid of not Meghan
I think when they again tried to put Meghan into some fake BS with the Kate and Tatler situation, pushed him to the point of no return even more because in desperation for clicks and to cover for other royals, they made his wife is a target again.
Exactly and harry cant be muzzled by the press or the palace cos he has already paid his dues, all his secrets were made public . Now he has so many secrets to reveal and he is starting with the media, soon he will go after his family . Either way I’m ready with my popcorn for the Windsor drama
I feel like he has a list of names with lawsuits drafted and waiting.
I think you’re right and I think its like @Osty says above – the benefit of Harry being the “Spare” and always being the scapegoat in the press etc is that he has no secrets. His life has been an open book in order to provide cover for William, so now he’s free to blow it all open if he wants.
The Cambridges are going to find it VERY difficult to explain this away as they ‘didn’t know’ considering Jones still works for them and Wootton was getting exclusives until recently.
There is clearly a LOT more tea to come on this and CEO Kate and Willileaks are NOT going to walk away smelling of roses this time – Harry means business and if has to incinerate that bridge with his brother to protect his family he will. There is no way Harry and Meghan will ever return to the RF fold, never when its now out in the public domain that his own brother and SIL were feeding stories to the press about them. They told us about this and now the proof is out there for all to see.
The truth about Willileak’s Rose Bush trimming will come out soon enough – that Tatler story about Kate and the Middletons was only the beginning.
KP will throw both Christian and his partner under the bus and pretend that they knew nothing and are also injured parties in this.
How they deal with Dan Wootton is more interesting. It’s obvious he’s on their payroll and their mouthpiece. Will they try to distance themselves from Dan to ‘look’ better? If so, Dan may turn his vengeance on them (he is a grade 10 weapon).
What will KP do if the Sussexess sue Dan? Dan and Murdoch have already threatened to sue BI if they published this story, so they are SPOOKED.
I’m more interested in how they deal with Dan more than how they deal with their leaker staff.
I agree, if they try to throw Wootton under the bus he will drop his payload and then some against both the Cambridges and the Middletons. He’s a nasty nasty man who has made many enemies.
Totally agree he is spooked, spooked because the whistleblower came from his side – it has to have been someone from his team, someone who had the access to know the details of the financial transactions to Jones’s partner.
And it also explains why Dan has been even more vicious in his recent Sussex coverage. I bet he knew on some level he would be implicated and is trying everything to make them look bad.
They got into bed with the wrong journalist and hopefully will pay the piper.
Dan is not scared. Dan has the receipts. He’s got Andrew receipts, Liz receipts, and Willy ceipts etc. You get the picture. The establishment knows everything. You know -The Intelligence Community, Media and so on. Murdock will try to divert attention from himself when it’s his turn in the barrel and throw Liz and her klan under the bus. I’ll be here for all the Harry was used as a tool to look away from the “Crooking & Criming” Andrew think pieces. Harry knew it was time to get the HELL out of Dodge. I wonder how he knew.🤔
No media outlet is reporting on this. Had it been incriminating towards Meghan there would be major headlines everywhere.
And that is what is so unfair,i believe there is a very small percentage of us that see the BS The Sussexes(especially) Meghan goes through. Most stories out there make her look bad and are so glowing for the Cambridges. And if you read enough crap about someone you will probably end up believing it,hence a majority of the negative comments on most other sites. If it wasnt for celebitchy i dont think i have ever read anywhere else even attempting to be fair.
Things are starting to change though. The Tatler article was the first and now supposedly there are comments on Twitter from RRs mocking the Cambridge’s. Sometimes there is a drip, drip, drip before the whole dam bursts.
The RR’s were not impressed by the photo KP posted of the kids yesterday.
Emily Andrews! It was funny to see some of the reactions (she posted about the new Cambridge photo of them volunteering, someone – another reporter – commented on it in a non-praising way and EA was like “yeah did they only volunteer once? we cant even see their faces.”) I saw very little coverage yesterday of that photo, and it used to be that if the Cambridges released a new photo the RRs went crazy.
Someone pointed out that EA used to be more critical of W&K (she apparently was the one who broke the “William barely works as an air ambulance pilot” story) so it will be interesting to see if she swings back that way.
Emily Andrews also wrote pretty critical articles of how poorly William and Kate acted during the tour in India. It seems she may be swinging back to that now that she is no longer colleagues with Wootton. And keep in mind KP burned her about the false information relating to the baby shower. They made her look like a fool. I’m sure she hasn’t forgotten. (There is a deleted tweet she made confirming the palace advised her of the details of the baby shower)
@Nic yeah I had forgotten about the India tour comments too! Was she the one super ticked about the mountain hike where Will and Kate wouldn’t let them go all the way with them?
And I do think the baby shower incident has soured her towards KP, because she did look like an incompetent fool.
There was another incident that someone had a screenshot of – I cant remember what it was….where she had written a story about will and kate and KP threatened with a lawsuit while she was on mat leave so she just took it down because she didn’t care about dealing with it. I am trying to google now but cant remember the details.
I don’t expect her to start writing glowing articles about Meghan but maybe her reporting will be a little less fawning of the Cambridges now…
That surprised me. 3 years ago it would have been par for the course, but Kate being put on such a high pedestal for so long almost made me forget people were ever critical. Emily Andrews from the Mail and Nick Dixon from Good Morning Britain had snarky comments about it being from the one single volunteer event in April and they poked fun at the quality of the photo.
I think the tides are slowly turning. Even Rebecca English praised both Meghans speech and charity work with the Mathew, relating to her by saying she also sponsors at a different kennel and encourages other people to take initiative with the animal charities. It’s like the twilight zone.
It’s ridiculous right? All these RRs who make out that they’re on par to Whitehouse correspondence are now completely mute on this subject. Yet they were more than happy to write about Meghan sacking nannies and raising gender neutral babies.
Unless KP has contacted the Rota and has threatened them with legal action if they speak out about the BI piece? If that’s the case, KP is suing people left, right and centre!
I’m sure quite a few of the royal reporters have their own quid pro quo deals with KP. Wootton’s the most notorious of the bunch, but he’s not the only one.
I weirdly think KP might keep him. Christian released a statement last night denying involvement, and the story still seems untouchable to most mainstream news outlets. Things never stick to the Cambridges so I unfortunately don’t expect this to either. I’m sure Harry will never be able to trust W&K again though.
I don’t know if I they’ll keep him @Taylor. Jones did not deny that his partner did leak the stories (only his involvement); and, Jones, himself, went to BI. No high-powered attorney. If W&K were going to defend Jones, I would think he would have threatened BI through an attorney and not approached BI himself.
Christian Jones has issued a vehement denial, but still does not explain why his partner received payments. Someone at KP was leaking about the Sussexes but somehow I doubt Jones will be let go or that this gets taken any further.
Well no one mentioned his name or asked for his comment so why did he reach out to deny ?
He can deny all he likes but there is a money trail from The Sun to his partner – always follow the money.
It seems like Harry’s lawyers got access to internal accounting information to confirm the payments to Jones’s partner which means not everyone inside KP / CH / BP was thrilled with the non stop leaks and tacit approval by KP. And the amount is specific so I have to wonder how that information came about.
And there’s the bit about how the payments were identified to a News Group accounting code. This could have come from discovery requests filed in Harry’s hacking suit.
&nic it would be wonderful if this were coming from Charles.
@Nic: I believe it came from a whistleblower inside of KP
I’m thinking it’s more someone working for Charles but we probably won’t ever know.
Someone mentioned on the thread from Friday that they think it might be Emily Andrews.
I do NOT want to rush to put her on a pedestal because she made one less than glowing comment on twitter about the Cambridges photo, lol, but it kind of fits?
She leaves the Sun, there was supposed bad blood between her and Wootton, if Wootton was paying someone for stories she would likely know about it (and that could have contributed to the bad blood because she is getting bad info from KP while DW is getting scoops, but then she figures out he is paying for the leaked information from someone very high up at KP). She would be in a position to point out the accounting issue.
I dunno. Whoever did leak this would have had to know about the money, and I don’t know how widespread that info would have been.
@becks I was thinking the same, especially with respect to the accounting information which seems to relate to payments by the Sun to the publicist. Emily would have had access to that knowledge at least until about December, at which time she left the Sun and was not allowed to say much until she started her new position six months later. Someone from inside the Sun had to have provided that info and as someone mentioned we don’t have anything about the Sussexit leak, but that happened in January and Emily was already gone from the Sun by then.
We don’t know for sure, but KP had already made her look foolish and Dan Wootton was an ass to work with while bragging about his contacts with KP so there would be some motivation to blow this up.
@laura, Jones denies his own involvement, not his partner’s.
Splitting hairs. Was he specifically named or did he out himself ?
@L4, Huhhh? She had stated “Christian Jones has issued a vehement denial, but still does not explain why his partner received payments.” I was just pointing out that Jones’ denial did not deny his partner’s leaking. To you splitting hairs, to me, accuracy.
As for whether or not Jones outed himself, he was named (but not directly blamed) in the article and it was pretty clear what the article implied, if not stated. Jones was responding to what most would infer from the article, that wittingly or not, he was the source of the leaked info.
Messy messy messy.
my guess is the defense from KP will be plausible deniability. Jones didn’t “mean” to spill sensitive information, it was just pillow talk! The Cambridges knew nothing about it! etc.
Something that is interesting to think about though IS how Jones and then Stephens got his information. So we can assume that Will and Kate told him, and that may be possible/probable for some things, but I do wonder about Sussexit. I keep circling back to the bit about Harry not wanting to write anything down. I wonder if Jones was actively snooping and looking for information – reading emails that he shouldn’t be reading, etc. Because something doesn’t need to be written down for William to talk about it, you know? Or maybe William did tell Jones about it but for something that big, Wootton wasn’t going to press without something confirmed, like the plans in writing. So Jones told Stephens who told DW after getting the info from William, but Wootton wanted more than just Stephens’ word on it. Wootton has been VERY adamant that his sourcing for Sussexit was rock solid.
Regardless, I think the fact that Jones is still employed there says a LOT. If the first two payments are from summer 2019, that means they kept him on for a year after (At this point) even if they had an idea that Jones was leaking information to Stephens and then to the press.
honestly, I think a lot of this comes back to what we have been saying for the past two years, but it just makes the “quid pro quo” a lot more obvious. We’ll give you dirt on Meghan and look the other way as you make money slamming her at every chance, and you leave us alone. maybe the Rose story WAS the trigger – Wootton has something big on them, so this way he gets other big stories (like Sussexit) and leaves the Rose story alone. Stephens gets paid either as a way to help KP avoid blame (“they knew nothing about it, he was profiting off his insider knowledge” even though the insider knowledge comes directly from Will and Kate) or just because he wanted $$ for being the middle man. 4k doesn’t seem like a lot though to take the fall for something like this.
This is just going to keep getting messier and I think as time goes on Harry’s behavior and decisions make a lot more sense.
The more information that becomes public via Byeline Investigates the more sympathetic people will become to the Sussex’s – remember what those journo’s said earlier in the year, that if the truth was known people would understand why they walked away.
I think the rest of the UK media are scared of touching this because they are up to their eyeballs in the same sh!t and because its an ongoing legal matter – they are prohibited from reporting on a live case as if it goes to court it could influence a jury.
Yes I also keep coming back to those comments in the late fall and then around Sussexit about “Something big” – it was also said that it didn’t involve Harry and Meghan, right? Clearly leaking confidential information about them would “involve” them as they were the victims of the leaks, but it wouldn’t “involve” them in the sense that they weren’t doing it. So I wonder if this is the tip of a much bigger iceberg in that regard.
I’d like to remind/encourage/persuade everyone to please click on the link for the article (on the Byline website), to encourage the few good media organizations out there. If you’re able to, please also donate to them – that is one real way to help the Duke & Duchess of Sussex, by supporting one media organization that’s fair to them.
I’ll simultaneously remind/encourage/persuade everyone to *RESIST* the temptation to click on that heinous website, the Daily Fail. Just think of each click you give them as a physical slap to Meghan’s face. If you find one of their headlines too tempting to resist, just look for the story in a smaller, less toxic website. I guarantee you, you’ll always find it.
Apologies for the preaching but it had to be said. 🙂
@Bella thanks for the reminder. Byline is going good work and should get the clicks or donations if someone is able, especially if the Sun is going to come after them.
Ok let’s pretend Kevin n Karen didn’t know he was leaking but surely a secret as big as Sussexit being leaked to a tabloid should have prompted a massive enquiry, surely someone there should have been wise enough to realise there is a breach n look into it . Them ignoring it smells so bad
I didn’t say that the Cambridges didn’t know he was leaking. I said the Cambridges will deny that they knew, which is something very different.
After Sussexit being leaked there should have been a full scale investigation within BP / CH / KP about how it was leaked to Wootton. In any other organization when sensitive information gets leaked to the media they always have heads rolling. Six months later nothing has changed. It’s obvious there was approval of the leaks and it’s really hard for the Cambridges to pretend they had nothing to do with the leaks when they still employ someone whose boyfriend got paid to speak to the press. They know exactly who was aware of Harry’s proposal. He didn’t send it to everyone and they could easily figure out who knew about the Sussexit plan. They just don’t care that it was leaked.
You’re precisely right, Nic919, and the Cambridges didn’t care because the media was kissing their ass and making them look good. Harry already knew it was Will who leaked the information. I don’t know if you all recall but, Harry met with his grandmother and Charles two hours privately before Will joined the meeting. He allegedly discussed the leaks and that it was coming from KP. The Queen and Charles also suspected it was KP. Certain things Will was not privy to that day. Dan Wooten and Piers Morgan were on the edge of their seats that day, waiting for the outcome of the meeting. We all had to wait 7-8 days for the Queen to release the final statement. Trust, they all know the leaks are coming from KP. The same way he leaked to the Press, they were in Canada and later California.
This is why Harry and Will most likely fell out.
Harry would have definitely told about his suspicions and Will did nothing. Harry may have told only Will something that came out in the press. It was more than supposedly telling Harry to slow down with Megan that caused the visible riff we saw with the brothers. At the wedding they were still looking like their old friendly selves.
I always felt the baby shower story was Harry and Meghans way of figuring out if KP was leaking. Emily Andrews said it was KP that told her the day of the baby shower.
I agree. Someone from KP gave Emily Andrews false information about the baby shower and once the story came out Harry and Meghan would know just who they told.
Nothing can touch the Cambridges unless the UK revolts. Congratulations anyway you have lost your brother.
Oh I think the Cambridges’ can be damaged. . .
BLM protests are occuring in London atm. . .
We’re in an interesting moment.
Any speculation on who the whistleblower might be? Is it possible it’s someone on the Sun considering Harry’s lawyers found out about the secret payments? This is gossip gold.
The Keenbridges have lost a lot of staffers recently so it could be any number of disgruntled people. Remember the woman who Kate fired right after the woman got back from her honeymoon? I still think it’s weird the Daily Fail write an article about it when they ignore all the other Keen staff dismissals.
Yeah, I remember her too. I believe her name was Sophie Agnew. I think that firing happened around late summer/early fall of last year? A longtime employee who got unceremoniously fired is certainly a good candidate.
Another possible leak could be Charles’ camp. I don’t know about the UK but in the States employers have great access to info from your work computers, phones, etc. (E.g., can record).
Charles is really the employer of the Cambridge staff. Could they have found something out & tipped off Harry’s “discovering” lawyers? Did William go too far?
Well, just a theory, anyway.
If not what about Catherine Quinn? She was still around at the beginning of the year (attended that skeezy joint Sussex and Wessex affair…where they showed everybody what a great family they are).
I think the whistleblower came from The Sun’s side because they had quite detailed information on the financial transactions to Jones’s partner which could only have come from an insider. It could have been Emily Andrews (as others on this thread have pointed out) as there was no love lost between her and Wootton or it could have been someone else – Wootton is well know in Fleet St as being a really really nasty bully.
Also after just googling Wootton and seeing his photo – he looks like he could be Perez Hilton’s brother.
They also said that the Sussexs had no control over his hiring which basically confirms what Sussexsquad has been saying for 3years. The cambridges were calling all the shots when they were at KP hence why the Sussex settled with old servants quarters and a shoe string budget from sovereign grant and office at BP. I’ve said this in another post, Prince Harry’s statement defending then girlfriend Meghan which didnt have royal seal and was titled “statement by secretary of prince harry” was my first clue that he was all alone😔after all the sacrifices and standing up for KeenKueen after her naked pictures and paparazzi stalking George…etc his reward was to be back stabbed because of jealousy and insecurity. I’m glad harry finally fighting back.
Plez guy follow byline and donate whatever you can. https://twitter.com/BInvestigates/status/1269584207447277568?s=19
I Just waffled on about this above, before seeing this. 😁😘
Yes, please click, follow and donate to Byeline Investigates. As I said above, it’s a potent way to support the Sussexes.
@Awkward Symphony and @Bella DuPont, you both made great points and I donated. The link was very helpful.
It is very sad. The spares are treated like crap. KP posted a picture of Will with George and Charlotte (damage control) and Will is only holding an umbrella over George and not Charlotte. It’s sickening. Poor Charlotte left in the rain. It proves how the spares are worthless in that family.’
Louis will be treated second class as well.
Like he held George’s hand and let Charlotte run after them during the Commercial Jet photo op.
Donated – it wasn’t much but if we all do it….
And its worth pointing out that one of the few times Meghan was papped in London after her marriage was when she was at lunch with Christian Jones. In retrospect it just seems a little too convenient that she got papped there considering how she flew under the radar for the most part in London. It definitely makes you think that Jones (or Stephens) tipped off the paps.
Good point. I remembered that picture and was just thinking about it, but the potential significance didn’t click until you just mentioned it.
excellent point. i can’t remember , is this after prince phillip crashed his car and they sent meghan out on a pap stroll to side track from the story?
As stated above, unfortunately scandal doesn’t appear to stick to the Cambridge’s, at least not yet. But I really don’t care at this point, Harry, Meghan and Archie are free from this horrible family and are well on their way to setting the world on fire and living their best life. The Cambridge’s can now settle in to enjoy their loveless marriage, complete with the knowledge that their “friends” really don’t like them and watch Harry, Meghan and Archie survive and thrive!!
Isn’t this Christian guy the same guy that gave Harry’s number to the fake Thunburg hackers?
I thought it was a female staffer.
No.
Telegraph:
‘The Duke of Sussex fell victim to Russian pranksters after Lorraine Heggessey, the former head of the Royal Foundation, unwittingly forwarded their email to him, The Telegraph can reveal.
The pranksters managed to make direct contact with the Duke by sending a message to Ms Heggessey, purporting to be from Greta Thunberg’s director and claiming that the teenage climate activist was keen to speak to him.
Ms Heggessey, 63, who became the first female controller of BBC One in 2000, declined to comment on her involvement on Saturday.
While she failed to make any security checks, sources insisted it was not her job to do so.
The prank happened at a time when the Sussexes are in flux after recently breaking away from the Royal Foundation to form their own charitable entity.
Their new private secretary, Fiona Mcilwham, had only just started, and Ms Heggessey is thought to have been trying to help.‘
Kaiser, wow, I agree with you. Will and Kate have found their scapegoat. They possibly set it up so that someone else will take the fall. Harry probably knows that Will and Kate were behind the leaks along with this Christian person but this is what Harry can prove now.
Tatler’s editor no doubt has the goods on the Cambridges. We have gotten a hint that he is not afraid of the Cambridges…..what else will he reveal to sell mags. Economies are in a tough spot right now.
I hope judgment day comes soon for the house of Windsor.
that picture of Meghan,hahahahahaha
The Letter Before Action might just be a gesture to pretend to defend himself. It’s kind of win-win for Wootton, unfortunately. If they’re right, he will look successful for having legitimate sources within KP. That will lend him credibility. Or, they’re wrong. In that case he’ll laugh at their conspiracy theory -accuse them of frivolous witchhunty lawsuits and throw this back in the face of H+M if they make other accusations in the future.
Lend him credibility ? I guess. “I’ve got the goods because I pay hard cash for them!”
So the Sun paid $4 grand to the KP Leaker for two stories last summer — a story about nannies and the godparents. Headlines so insignificant that I can’t even remember them. It’s still such a small bit of change, considering who the players are.
But where is the recorded payment for leaking Sussexit? THE biggest royal story of the year? One would think that there would be a huge payment somewhere for leaking THAT story. And, did the story come from the same KP leaker? Or, was that leak from someone else? Someone in KP who didn’t need money but needed silence instead. A little reward for not spilling the tea (or publishing photos) about Will and Rose?
Good point – we are all talking about Sussexit but the payments from summer 2019 (the nanny story was how they had gone through 3 nannies already or something dumb like that). Either they haven’t been able to track that payment, or there wasn’t a payment for that leak, which would fit in with what some people were saying above. There WASNT an investigation into who leaked it because they know who leaked it, and if it was William, what are Charles or the Queen going to do about it? Nothing.
Wills leaks the Sussexit story to Wooten/Sun to keep the Rose affair quiet, not realizing that the Sun is routinely paying for lesser stories. So the obvious question is: how/why did the Sun/Wooten get the Sussexit leak for free?
Wills may have shot himself in the foot if he didn’t at least tell Wooten to make it seem like someone, anyone, got money for the Sussexit story. Because the lack of a payment trail for that story inevitably raises lots of questions.
Weren’t H&M especially careful when they moved into Frogmore Cottage, aware servants were tattler’s? I could see a safe with vital papers and information, phone security, always cautious of who was in their presence. Counting the days for W,K and C hitting a hard bottom. As they say, thick as thieves.
Now lets see how long it takes for KP to fire Christian Jones and say they’re “shocked and dismayed” before blaming it on Meghan. I would not be surprised if they kept him on though and act like nothing happened.
I take no joy in the fact Harry’s family betrayed him. It’s unimaginable to me. My brothers would take on anyone to protect me, as I would for them.
I do take joy in the fact that the lies and falsehoods are collapsing in on the Cambridges and the RF.
I hope it all comes out especially about the money and finances of the foundations and the RF. Is it too much to dream?
The affair(s) are sensationalism – honestly if it’s between consenting adults at the end of the day I don’t care. It’s not my marriage.
I do care about them siphoning off funds from charities to fund their lifestyle.
What I really hope is that once (if) the curtain is pulled back, Andrew is going to be expendable. There could be no bigger distraction from the FFK’s consensual dalliance and misappropriation of funds than to truly expose him.
@Charfromdatrock so well said. My childhood was full of trauma and the harshness of rez life, but my siblings would never do this to me and we protected (protect) each other with our lives. So that must really hurt, truth can heal and justice for victims of the queen’s favorite would be a big win and balm imo. Affairs do hurt partners, but like you said, it’s their marriage and I, also, don’t care. W&K make themselves vulnerable by caring about appearances: shocking if an affair is exposed, denials about a magazine that is for the toffs. Long before it became a widely known saying, (so I’m attributing it to my mentor) a beloved teacher taught me “What other people think is none of your business.” I carry that and it’s very freeing. I can’t always get there instantly (I’m no saint), but I always can eventually.
W&K sell themselves as the perfect marriage, so perfect they cannot work harder because they have to be with their kids and be the #pigeonshrug couple
W&K&Carole threw Meghan and Harry under the bus for a year in exchange for reporters staying silent on William’s affair(s).
Some people insist Charles shouldn’t be king and head of the Church of England because he was unfaithful. If William is also unfaithful? Where are the calls to skip both Charles and William, instead going for George (with a Harry Regency)?
If William was sleeping around and NOT
– playing with lives (Harry, Meghan, Archie)
– endangering lives (leaking their location in Canada)
– kissing up to tabloids
– playing public games about how he should be king instead of elderly Charles
Then sure, who cares if he sleeps around. As it stands? William cheating and his actions around all of that? The public deserves to know. Just as the public deserved to know when he was lying about working at EAAA. When they dumped the Paralympians to go on vacation. When they pulled that PR stunt with the jet. When taxpayer money is spent on Carole’s security. etc. etc. etc.
I just keep thinking back to Harry and Meghan’s engagement interview when he was so happy and proud to say that Meghan would finally have this big, warm family around her. The realization for him that it wasn’t just the press that have been against her, but his own brother who he’d always been so close to-that must be so painful. I hope he’s continuing to get therapy to work through that betrayal.
Karma could come to William. If his children marry people that William disapproves of.
I feel so badly for Harry too…I had a sibling turn unexpectedly (and she didn’t even try to sell me out to the papers!), and it is the one life betrayal that stings more than any other – more than my divorce, more than all the other petty betrayals in life we all go through combined. It hurts most because – regardless of whatever petty sibling squabbling that naturally happen – it’s the one betrayal you don’t see coming. I think Harry really believed his family would have his back. It must be absolutely gut wrenching for him to know that’s where the heaviest damage to his wife came from. It screws with your entire world view. I hope he’s dealing with it in therapy too.
Well, well, we’ll. I personally thought the main culprit was Jason, but knowing Christian’s connection to Wooten I’m not too shocked. It was obvious that it was sanctioned after no one was fired for the baby shower leak or the Canada leak. I mean Dan Wooten gloated about getting stories from the palace. This makes the whole BRF look horrible imo. They fueled the smear campaign and leaks that put Meghan and Harry in danger. I’m getting more and more convinced that they wanted her dead. Probably still do.
They definitely wouldn’t have cared if she lost the baby; the absolute terror they put her through! Unforgivable.
What if the payments are traced back to Carole? Can you imagine the fallout? Anyhoo, the Byline article was so good. There is no way W&K were ignorant of what was going on. Top secret information about a Senior Royal was being leaked to the tabs. Where was the investigation? The leaks stopped when Harry removed his family to another continent. Only for their move to LA to leak after Charles’ illness? Charles doesn’t benefit from revealing that information, but William does because the tabs can now concentrate on the Sussexes & ignore the Cambridges again. Everything leads back to the Cambridges.
I still think Carole (and Jason) is one of Wootton’s sources. It would be great if there was evidence to back this up!
No matter what happens, royals protect the heir to the throne and they will do whatever it takes. How they protect Andrew and they will surely protect will and his reputation. Also someone in the above asked why harry didnt name will and kate directly, if he does, william will throw tantrum and ask Charles to cut off Sussex security and it will be a nightmare for sussex because of paps trouble in their home. That’s why Sussex didn’t name them directly. In the end Charles and after him William own the duchy money and he can do whatever he wants. As of now, Sussex depends on the money from the royal.
Charles isn’t paying for their security, they’re using the security currently assigned to Tyler Perry’s house. And will hire their own when they move out
According to the Times’ source, the GDBA protection forms part of Perry’s “security team that was already employed at the house where they are currently living” though it was noted it is not known if the couple is contributing to costs.
The source also added that the Sussexes “have not yet hired a permanent detail” and were only using the reported GDBA team “temporarily.”
I think security cost is still murky and they didn’t fully disclose who pays. I still think Charles pays some. Still not sure if harry can fully get access to his money from Diana. The firm won’t allow that much money out of them going out.
Harry has full access to his inheritance from Diana, has since he turned 30. Charles can pay privately for Sussex security out of the hundreds of millions in private cash he will inherit, tax-free, when QEII passes.
Tin foil tiara – Jones is the one that takes the fall when this blows up and it will. Andrew’s mess indicates chickens do come home to roost. The Cambridges look bad because no internal investigation for the leak. Jones should have been canned – pink slipped, sacked whatever – immediately for his indiscretion. Wooten is probably leaning on the Cambridges: fire my friend or I’ll spill ALL the tea – you ordered the leaks; you pushed the press to weaponize Bad Dad and you were Rose gardening on Kate’s watch.
At the time of Sussexit hitting the news, I recall a story about how Andrew was apparently fuming at KP’s press team accusing them of leaking about him – William has taken a leaf out of his parents PR book as both Chuck and Diana leaked stories about the rest of the RF to deflect from their martial problems. Its pretty obvious that their is trouble in that relationship, they can barely stand to be near each other for public engagements.
Christian is easy to deal with – throw him under the bus, let him take all the blame and slyly give him a bigass pay-check to keep his mouth shut and recommend him to one of their wealthy friends.
Its Dan who is the bigger problem. This guy is a class A narcissist and will throw an absolute meltdown if KP try to distance themselves on their terms or try to throw him under the bus too. This guy blackmailed one of his own colleagues and forced him out of the closet! He has no shame or fear. They might have played their hand with him.
I wish Philip Schofield would just come out and say he only outed himself because of Wootton – everybody knows he only did it to get ahead of a story that Wootton was planning on running outing him.
Karma would be Philip Schofield being the whistleblower..lol
The whole thing with Phillip Schofield was horrifying. Imagine doing that to someone.
Your reporting is a bit confused about the “Letter Before Action”.
The so called “Letter Before Action” was sent by Harry not the Sun. Basically, (as I understand it) Harry is about to commence legal proceedings against The Sun and Dan Wootton. However, English Civil Procedure calls for this type of preliminary formal notice to see if the matter can be resolved before a formal Writ of Summons is filed. This is why the Sun and Dan Wootton had to lawyer up.
Byline Investigates got wind of Harry’s notice and reached out to the Sun and Dan for comment. They refused to comment and threatened Byline with legal action if they published the story. Byline published anyway, relying on fair comment/public interest.
I don’t think either sun or dan is afraid of this lawsuit. Rupert has friends in high places and these buddies have each other backs. Unlike usa where most media and judges are left-wing but in UK most judges and media come from upper class and aristo , elite club. They rarely turn against each other. How the tabloids got away from many things is because of those high people. Sussex will have tough fight and we have to wait and watch.
The US judiciary has been significantly changed by Trump and McConnell. They were very blatant and open about it. Straight up to the Supreme Court with Gorsuch and Kavanaugh making a conservative majority. It will be one of their strongest and deadliest legacies, innumerable new federal judges who are young and hyper-conservative. Saying US judges are left wing is so incorrect. The US judiciary probably never really was and it certainly isn’t now. And by the way we have significant right wing media, not just Fox but The Federalist et al.
Political leanings of judges in the US varies wildly depending on state and county, but at every level of the justice system the majority skew conservative. Elected judges (such as at the county level) are more likely to be less conservative, or even downright liberal, but many are appointed positions with either extremely long terms or a lifetime appointment.
In recent years the hard right turn that the major mainstream Republican party has taken may have somewhat confused the issue by accusing normal conservatives and moderate conservatives of being liberals because they won’t go along with it, but they’re still on the right.
@L80
Thanks for clarifying, I also saw the “letter before action” came from Harry not Wootton.
Also, Wootton threatening a publication to not report on something just makes me think that’s common practice for him, so other news outlets not reporting on this maybe be also due to that.
Also it wouldn’t surprise me if that’s something Will and Kate do constantly given how that’s exactly how they reacted to the Tatler article.
Funny how they were angry in accusing Tatler of not running the “Catherine the Great” piece by them before publishing it—just goes to show how these leaks by Wootton and his sources definitely got channelled through the KP camp and they were aware (if not involved) with all the leaks and chose to do sh*t all about it.
FYI- the full Byline article our author so kindly linked- well worth the full read on a rainy Sunday morning. It is excellent!
Thanks for writing stories on Sunday morning Celebitchy team. We appreciate it.
Yes! Thank you!
Yes, @Ariel and @NextToMe it is appreciated on the rainy day (and other days) here too.
CB Sunday stories mean more to me than you’ll ever know.
They’re my lifeline 🤗💃
agreed. seeing this was like a special sunday morning treat. lovely
I want to add my thanks for providing us with Sunday morning reading.👏👏👏
You left out one of the puppeteers in this story – RUPERT MURDOCH!!!!!!!!!!!! The man who pays everyone to leak and lie.
I am living for the tea, the drama and most of all the karma!
The British tabloids are toxic, has whipped up so much hate towards minorities and have ruined people’s lives; they should be held accountable for the damage they cause.
If anyone wants to help, Byline Investigates have a crowdfunder to help fund their investigations: https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/support-our-investigation-into-hacking-at-the-sun
Donated from the US!
@Ruby_woo
Thank you, i’ll be donating from Canada as soon as I can. It won’t be much ‘cause the conversion sucks, but these guys are not even asking for much so it seems doable if we can help in some way.
Operation Sun Down, love it!!!
I hope this revelations help Meghan and Harry I do believe that the Cambridge’s are involved in the leaking of information to the sun. I believe that the Cambridge’s used Jones to be their middle man to leak information to Dan I think they also used some of the other royal reporters as well . The Perfect innocent act that the Cambridge’s put on for the public and their fans is starting to slipped first the Tatler story and Now this Remember when William was all about hating the press would threat them if they take pictures of his kids or write about him . And all suddenly he pro press giving the press access to his kids William realize that he could use the press to destroy his rival Harry . When all the lawsuits are done with I do believe that the Cambridge’s image and Reputation will be damage beyond repair they released pictures of their kids like always to deflate for the bad press this week and all of the royal reporters who hype them up and praise the Cambridge’s for release picture of their kids to the public. Even the royal reporters are over the Cambridge’s using their kids as Pr .
I don’t think the lawsuit will reveal about Cambridge and I have said the firm and UK government will protect the heir to the throne and bojo is pro-monarchy. I think one of the reasons why Sussex is not spilling the tea because both the firm and Sussex have dirt on each other and both waiting on each other to drop the tea first. The press will not certainly go against the heir because press and brf have a love-hate relationship. They need each other and the lawsuit is against the press not against Cambridge. The firm will make sure to hide Cambridge’s name from the press. I don’t think the press will certainly change their narrative even if they lost the suit. If they lose I mean press, they will pile upon so many more lies and because in this suit to Sussex only sued for copyright, not for defamation.
I don’t believe that the Sussex’s are involved in leaking anything to press I don’t believe that they are blackmail anyone . I think Harry and Meghan realize that they had a problem with press especially the sun getting information about them I think they realize something was up when Meghan baby showers plans were reported on by Emily . The Palace can and will protect William for bad press but the same protection won’t help Dan and Jones and the Cambridge’s reputation I believe will suffer everyone know that William and Kate are in charger of their staff what does that say about them as the future king and queen they allowed a staff member . To leak information about a royal family member the staff was allowed to leak sensitive information about security about a royal family member who at the time were receiving death threats . What does that say about the whole Regal Perfect never putting a foot wrong Cambridge’s and the Narrative about the Sussex’s is already starting to Change the world is changing it wouldn’t be so easy for the meghaters and the royal reporters to spread lies about Meghan.
There is no dirt to be had on the Sussexes. As written above, all of Harry’s secrets were told every moment they happened. He had no protection from the press from the time he turned 17/18.
The dirt, mud, muckraking is all on the part of W&K, Carole, and whatever other households wanted to hide a story (Queen about Andrew, etc.). The Sussexes aren’t in the wrong here, and haven’t lowered themselves to sling mud like the others. When outside lawsuits come, especially around leaks & phone hacking, even the royals who participated are not immune.
The press came for W&K plenty, around their laziness, their spending, William not working at EAAA. That stopped temporarily when Meghan came on the scene. We’ve seen in the last two weeks, the press is starting to come after W&K, Carole, the affair story, and more. With the leaks about Harry and Meghan drying up, the RRs and tabloids are going after closer targets.
My take: Harry already has ALL the receipts for every single betrayal, however, he was constrained from dropping them due to the onset of Covid-19. What we’re witnessing now is a man who’s sending encrypted messages to his brother, SIL and SIL’s mother that should they attempt to drag his wife any further, he will damn all consequences.
Notice how they’ve stopped linking Meghan to the Tatler debacle? Yep, Harry has their number and he’s showing that he won’t stand idly while they drag Meghan.
Something big is about to happen within the RF and this time, the Lamebridges won’t survive it unscathed.
They may not escape it fully, but sadly they have enough press power that it won’t be fully covered. And no matter what they do, Will is the future monarch. One of the many proofs that the system needs abolished, in my opinion. There is no real mechanism to not allow the monarch to be a horrible person, all because he was born first.
Charles is the future monarch and the press has come for him plenty. This isn’t The Netherlands, there is no media code preventing publication of stories without royal approval.
W&K do not have ultimate power over the press, not when the press is facing multiple lawsuits for getting in bed with the CamBitches (thanks to whomever came up with that one).
I don’t believe Harry WANTS to spill all his family’s secrets. But I believe that he WILL if he as to in order for them to leave hiM and his family alone. And more importantly, his family knows he CAN spill all their secrets.
With the Andrew/Epstein situation gaining momentum (the DOJ recently sent a formal request to Home Office) I think the RF will be under renewed scrutiny, if we then add Harry’s case + the #BLM movement + Americans being woke to how Meghan was treated, then you have a scandal that even the RF can’t sweep away. It’s a drip drip drip until the bough breaks. Wait for it.
And yes, the monarchy needs to go. Expeditiously.
I disagree that he’d open this all up to show that his brother was behind a lot of the smears. That’s just not his, or Meghan’s, personality. I really believe that he still wants to protect the Queen, his father, and the monarchy as an institution. He’s still very duty oriented.
Same. I browsed through some of the other Byline Investigates pieces and came across one that talks about Meghan’s law suit against the Fail. She filed a response to the Fail’s defense and included in it were the texts that she sent to her father before the wedding, both from her and Harry, asking him to talk to her and get in touch with her ASAP.
It struck me that the tone of those text messages wasn’t even angry or frustrated, but rather worried and imploring. Her father comes up quite a bit in the rest of the filing and it talks about him as being vulnerable and misled by the Fail and the paps. It specifically states that she holds the Fail’s parent company accountable for what had happened with Thomas Markle.
I mean, I’m not Meghan, I’m not going to explain to her how she should feel as a third party who’s digesting this stuff from the outside through the tabloids. But I feel like she is taking incredible pains to be charitable towards her father when she would be fully justified in being angry about his behaviour. I think a part of it is definitely out of her desire to strike back at the tabloids rather than make this a family dispute, which is fair. But even then, I don’t think that fully explains the way she discusses her dad in the filing. I think she’s trying to avoid any further fall out because she does intend on patching up the relationship at some point or at least keeping that door open.
I think this is the case with Harry too. A part of it is a desire to get the tabloids where they’re doing things wrong, and bringing up family disputes is a distraction from all of that. But I also think he does care about them, especially the Queen, even if they don’t necessarily deserve it and don’t exactly reciprocate.
I am confused by the legal implications of the Byline Investigates article. It sounds like it is ok for journalists to pay for information. (I know the Daily Mail for example has a statement that it will pay for news.) It seems that Jones is the only one that could be prosecuted for relaying information because I assume he would have signed a nondisclosure agreement for the royal family. But Jones is protected because his partner was the one that was paid by Wooton.
So no one is in trouble yet, correct?
Jones would be in trouble for breaching confidentiality at his workplace. There is no way for his partner to know any of the inside information without Jones telling him. The fact that no investigation took place following the leak about Sussexit would strongly suggest that one party wanted the information leaked and its looking like the Cambridges. If your communications director is leaking information to the media then normally you turf him. Jones is responsible for his partner knowing anything that belongs at Jones’s workplace. Sussexit was not public information and there is no other way for Jones’s partner to know any details about it to sell to Wootton.
Wootton is unlikely to have done anything illegal by paying for a story. It’s Jones and his partner who are in trouble. Or should be.
Thanks for laying this out so succinctly. I read the Byline Investigates article and suffered from information overload.
KP is very powerful. This doesn’t surprise me, their money and influence travels far. ANyday of the year, no matter what she did or didn’t do there is Kate on the cover of every magazine at the checkout line. KP and their grey men have polished a very lively Kate, drunk and rolling around the dance floor into a CEO quiet type comparing her to the likes of Bill Gates. These people know exactly what they’re doing. With billions of dollars at their disposal, they’re not reaching for the skies with the RF they’re reaching for the stars.
KP doesn’t have ultimate power over the press. BP and Clarence House are far, far stronger and they don’t have ultimate power either. It is all tit for tat. The scapegoats walked out the door and left all the other Houses backstabbing each other.
For all the embiggening stories of Kate in the last few years? Plenty of stories about her laziness, her husband’s affair, the messy Middletons. W&K&Carole’s big failing is they THINK they are PR geniuses. When issues like law are involved (phone hacking), royals connected to the tabloids doing the illegal activity will also go down.
It’s a strategy, they want to ingrain into our media so much that we can’t imagine life without them, people have that sentiment for the queen and WK are continuing on that (thats how I felt about MIchael Jackson when he died, I couldn’t imagine a world without him, lol). William and Kate want to one up celebrities instead of being loud, boisterious, show offs (they’ll leave that narrative for Meghan) they want to appear above that. A lot of Celebithces use the word uncharismatic to describe William & Kate, but my guess is that their pr agents don’t see that as a bad thing, some of the top exectutives of billionaire companies and smartest people on the planet are uncharismatic probably most of them are, a lot prefer quiet people over charismatic types. WK are angleing at this and they are very coniving because some idiots are actually being fooled.
Every era of royal family has had scandals, but Andrew, the death of the Queen and any illegal payments linked to tabloids might just be their undoing– We’ll see if the The People have patience for this.
It doesn’t matter that William and Kate are boring. It matters that they are lazy, backstabbing, and abusive.
I get the strong feeling that the Royal family is so full of self absorbed people that no one ever realized Harry is a fighter who WILL cut you.
Well look at that. It seems that those of us who believed Will and Kate were behind the leaks and smear campaign of Meghan were right. I’m curious to see how the few insistent Cambridge defenders on here will try to downplay this story as it continues to develop.
They will say Jones went rogue ignoring how revealing confidential information from your workplace that hits the media at minimum starts an investigation once the info goes public (so January) and yet jones is still working for them. And the byline story talks about leaks from last summer. It’s even worse because we are looking at a year of nothing being done to stop the then dissemination of confidential information.
I see that the Queen is already signaling her support for the Cambridge’s with the photo of William and the kids, when they volunteered back in April, in support of Volunteer Week. I really feel badly for Harry
Not surprised, she’s also covering for Andrew’s security (taxpayer money!!!).
Yeah, this is not a good look for anyone in the Cambridge camp, but I think they will be able to squeak out of it by having their guy Jones say he was “betrayed” by his partner, didn’t know anything about payments etc, and maybe quietly put him on paid leave hoping everyone forgets.
Of course that’s bull – if this kind of sensitive information leaked in any other workplace, there would have been a thorough investigation and probably dismissal last year. The silence speaks volumes.
If these payments were brought to light by accounts subpoenaed (I don’t know if this is the correct word, help me legal experts!) by Harry and Meghan’s lawsuit, somebody had to know they were there, right? It will be interesting to see if the info came from a whistle blower or if this is such common practice from KP that Harry knew which rocks to turn over. This can’t be the only one.
Jones is liable for telling his partner confidential information from his workplace. Anyone who tells their spouse workplace secrets and that info gets to the media, they get fired. Insider trading cases where the spouse uses information learned by the employee also places liability on the one who divulged the information. And I know this is how it works in the UK because I just had to do a training workshop on the issue of confidentiality for the UK based company I work for.
There is the also added issue of Jones working for a government entity and so there are probably even more regulations on privacy and confidentiality to be considered.
Oh, yes, I absolutely agree it’s a breach of confidentiality! I was thinking KP might try to get away with claiming that poor Jones was misled or tricked etc to garner sympathy and hope that nobody wants to pursue it. However, I did not consider the government entity angle – that could get real messy real fast:o
Another tin foil tiara – David Watkins was once the social media manager for the Sussexes and the Cambridges hired him. What if HE was spilling the tea to Byline? Watkins is on the inside in KP and he may have come across some secrets. And – Watkins may want to avenge his former bosses. Watkins would only have to tell Byline enough for it to investigate further. This also proves her how dumb KP is – why hire somebody who use to work for the “enemy”? After Tatler-gate and this story House Cambridge consists of William and Kate as the wannabe Medicis (minus the poisonings) with the Middletons as the modern day Boleyns. Both of those houses eventually fell. Irony and Karma would certainly kick in if this branch of the House of Windsor is not the future but the end.
Can you imagine if Ma Middleton had any actual power? The gall of her and Keen Karen to think they can treat Harry (the actual blood prince) and Meghan this way…how horrible are these up jump cut throats?
I now also understand why the Yorks refused to curtsey to Keen Karen. It makes a lot of sense now. She clearly mean girled the York Sisters and rubbed her ‘status’ into their faces and and Paedo Andy stepped in and said ‘noped’, not my girls.
What a horrible set up people. I wonder if Penis with Teeth will eventually come to his senses and dump the Middletons? I wonder if they know the thought has crossed his mind which would also explain the Keen Karen embiggening in the last 2 yrs and the recent Catherine the Great article which back fired??
Something is coming for the Cambridges..which explains the recent ‘leak’ about them volunteering to the help line for vulnerable. They are trying hard to change the narrative and do a ‘look at us helping’ play.
Well this made my day. With all the serious shite happening in the world, it’s good to know that some of those creating said shite will have to face their day in court. The noose is tightening on the House of Cards, aka the House of Windsor, and the Cambridges have really stepped into a pile of poo this time. I don’t know how they’ll manage to fake their way out of this one and I can’t wait for more tea to be spilled as the noose tightens on the leaking and those who condoned the leaking. It seems to go right to the top. I’m sure Harry and Meghan are sitting back, sipping margaritas and snacking on guacamole, just waiting for the House of Cards to tumble.
The Cambridges got into bed with the wrong journo – Wootton is as nasty as they come and he is not here to play. If the Cambridges try to throw him under the bus or stop giving him what he wants he WILL burn them – the dirt on the Cambridges and Middletons go back years.
Jones is not the only leaker at KP – this tea is not finished spilling.
All of this nonsense and backstabbing and sabatoging because of a black girl’s popularity and because she actually has a brain along with her own money and work ethic.This is really so damn pathetic and just plain evil.Rachel Meghan only wanted to help her husband and in turn help this Unroyal Family but they are so effn pathetic and have their noses in the air that they couldn’t even accept her help.She didn’t want or try to steal anybody’s spotlight; but them being so into themselves, they couldn’t see that.Nobody in that cesspool cares about anybody in the family let alone anybody on the outside.What an effn nightmare Meghan walked into all for the sake of love and Harry knows this and it’s why he’s gone guns ablazing.The most pathetic so called royal family out there but 2020 is the year of the unvealing and more will come out.The whole institution is evil af.All of those mfers will eventually burn with their stunted growth asses.
Karma is riding in on the “You Could Have Had a Bad Bitch” bus.
Karma is coming for this useless archaic institution. The removal of imperial statues of slave owners in Bristol today means that it’s only time before the protestors connect the dots to realise that the monarchy was the main instigator and benefactor of the slave trade and how this colonial institution still enjoys those stolen money/jewls..etc
This isnt like any other protest I’ve seen in my lifetime. There is a revolution happening. One that the politicians cant quash or silence
I wonder why PHarry agreed to issue that joint statement with William that William was not at all a bully. Well he is. He bullied his kid brother (and his wife ) out of U.K. He also must have bullied PHarry to issue this joint statement before he leaves U.K. or else….
*puts on tin foil hat* Well that statement did make for the perfect set up of the “William was set up and manipulated by the evil ‘Middletons! Kate has to go!” plot line. *takes off said hat*
Wasn’t that statement issued by William’s team, right around when Harry and Meghan released the info that no one else would speak for them? Leads me to believe William issued that statement and Harry decided it wasn’t worth fighting that set of his brother’s lies at that moment.
Someone on here recently said on another thread that a RR said that Harry had nothing to do with that statement. If a RR did indeed say that, can we have the source? Anyone?
The fact the William issued a statement that he was NOT a bully means that he must be aware of what people are saying about him. The only way to rectify that is to show support to his brother and try and rebuild relationships, but instead he continues with his smear campaign against them. Surly he would know that smearing the Sussex’s is what ruined his reputation in the first place. I can’t understand why these the Cambridge’s continues to do the exact same this, they seem to believe if they continue to smear them, it will make their reputation better.
And the other shoe just dropped…
There’s reporting that SDNY has formally requested testimony from Prince Andrew through a mutual legal assistance treaty with the UK as part of a criminal investigation into alleged accomplices of Jeffrey Epstein 😶
The report I saw said it was the US Dept of Justice that filed the request. They ain’t playing around.
Well, the US Dept of Justice just formally filed a request to question Prince Nonce… oh excuse me, Prince Andrew. These kinds of requests are apparently supposed to be kept confidential until a decision is made but OOPSIE somebody leaked!! The inbred racist trailer trash in tiaras certainly have their hands full.
So Andrew’s security team was cut but Mummy intervened so he still has his tax-payer paid security.
what?
It was put out there to protect Williams reputation regardless of whether Harry participated in the issuing or not. The most important message was William was not a bully as that was contrary to being head of his anti bullying campaign.
I was reading a few daily mail comments about Meghan and Harry’s looking at the blm organization and educating themselves about it first before commenting. Those shitstains at that dm are so ignorant. I have to believe most are bots. If they truly knew the deal between the Sussex and the royal family-they would know that part of the deal is to still be respectable and carry themselves properly even after stepping down-that was stated before they went back to Canada. If I knew that why don’t the commenters/shitstains. The articles written on day one when the Brits learned about Meghan and Harry’s relationship was sexiest, racist, and downright evil. The receipts are in the articles from 2016-2020. They keep proving the Sussex case of mistreatment by the press there. If they are so irrelevant and not important why spend your time writing about them-Clickbait for sure and hate for sure. She was speaking to the high school seniors. They are still trying to control what/who the Sussexes talk and work with. It is none of their business anymore at least until next year-why not leave it at that. That would show fairness to them. What reporters or magazines they talk to is no longer British tabs concern-you look like you stuck on stupid everytime someone in the media mentions something about them. I really like them even though I will probably never meet them-so I will respond on this site to articles being unfair and evil. If I could talk or say to the Daily Mail commenters-wtf is wrong with you-insanity is disease you need to get some therapy to improve your mind and your heart-they talk like people with hoof and mouth disease-get a grip and get a life-through therapy.
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