Meghan Markle’s sister claims Duchess ‘defamed her to prevent truth about rags to riches’
Meghan Markle’s half-sister has claimed the Duchess defamed her to “cover up” her “rags to riches” narrative, a court has heard.
Samantha Markle is suing the Duchess of Sussex on grounds of “defamation and injurious falsehood” over the interview Meghan and Prince Harry carried out with Oprah Winfrey.
That bombshell interview back in 2021 has seen Samantha Markle level a suit against the Duchess of Sussex, seeking £62,000 ($75,000) in damages, The Mirror reported.
READ MORE: Meghan and Harry coronation attendance would be ‘huge coup’ after ‘destructive campaign’
The disgruntled half-sister of Meghan is claiming that the comments made by the Duchess in the Oprah interview and in biography Finding Freedom amounted to “humiliation, shame and hatred” at her “on a worldwide scale”.
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(Image: ITV/GMB)
A motion to dismiss was already heard at the case, with judge Charlene Edwards Honeywell presiding over the trial that Meghan’s legal team are attempting to have thrown out.
Samantha’s lawyer, Peter Ticktin, has claimed that Meghan used the book to “affirm this false narrative that she supposedly lived this rags to riches thing.”
He added: “She got caught. She was lying about her education, that she was getting all these scholarships. Her father paid for her education for goodness sakes, and she got caught with this lie.
“Why else is she putting her sister down? Why else is she putting her father down? Why else is she denying her family who has done nothing but good to her all her life? She never had a problem with them at all.”
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(Image: Chris Jackson/Getty Images)
His comments, which also claimed Meghan did not realise her “innocent” sister had received “hundreds of threats on her life” had been to cover up a “nonsense” story.
Meghan’s lawyer, Michael Kump, branded the comments as “inappropriate” and “quite frankly offensive to my client”.
Mr Kump had added: “Not every perceived slight ought to be litigated and that’s true here. Plaintiff [Samantha] is taking issue with Meghan’s own impressions of her own childhood growing up but that’s not a proper subject matter for a court of law.”
Judge Honeywell is reported to have been “struggling” to see how Meghan could be responsible for publishing the statements, while Mr Ticktin noted that the case was “not the strongest case in the world”.
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