Duchess of Sussex subjected half-sister to 'ridicule, contempt and disgrace,' court hears

The Duchess of Sussex subjected her estranged sister to “ridicule, contempt and disgrace” by portraying her as a “disgusting opportunist”, a court has heard.

Peter Ticktin, a lawyer for Samantha Markle, claimed that Meghan had caused her half sister “great harm” by suggesting that she had only changed her surname back to Markle to cash in after she started dating Prince Harry.

Ms Markle, elder daughter of Thomas Markle, the Duchess's father, is seeking unspecified damages over claims the Duchess made in her March 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey, which she has alleged subjected her to "humiliation, shame and hatred on a worldwide scale".

She has accused Meghan of telling “false and malicious lies” about her fairytale “rags-to royalty” upbringing at her family's expense and has contested her half-sister's claim that she “grew up as an only child”.

The Duchess’s legal team is attempting to get the case thrown out, arguing that she did not deny having a half sister and that her opinions and recollections of growing up were not “proper subject matter” for litigation in court.

The motion to dismiss the case was heard on Wednesday by Florida judge Charlene Edwards Honeywell.

'Opinions are not and cannot be defamatory'

Michael Kump for the Duchess, said that “not every perceived slight” should be litigated and that calling someone an opportunist was not defamatory.

“The right to voice opinions, to even criticise, are even fundamental rights granted by the First Amendment,” he said. “Opinions are not and cannot be defamatory...there's no way to determine if it's true or false.”

Mr Kump argued that the Duchess had not accused Ms Markle of changing her name to “cash in on her new found fame”.

Instead, he said she had told Ms Winfrey that her half sister had changed her name when she was in her early 50s, when she started dating Prince Harry and had added: “So I think that says enough.”

He told the judge: “The fair reading of that is that Meghan is saying to the interviewer, we've talked enough in this very short period about Samantha Markle.”

The Duchess also said that she did not feel comfortable talking about people she did not really know and that she “grew up as an only child”.

Mr Kump told the court: “(It) was not a statement of an objective fact involving genetic or DNA or biology. Rather, it was a statement and expression of her own personal and subjective feelings and beliefs about how she experienced growing up and how she feels today about her childhood.”

He added that Meghan did not say she had only met her sister “a handful of times” as the complaint suggests.

'Definite harm and damage that was done'

Mr Ticktin said the Duchess’s claims had “killed” Ms Markle’s career.

He told the judge: “Words are defamatory when they ‘tend to subject one to hatred, distrust, ridicule, contempt, or disgrace, or tend to injure one in one's business or profession.’

“In this case, we've got it all.”

He described the Duchess as someone with “a great deal of popularity, a great deal of sway in society” who had made remarks about someone who was not famous and could not afford the protection she now needed due to the death threats he blamed on Meghan’s comments.

“This is not just a case where somebody is trying to make a dig at her sister because of a personal problem,” he said.

“This is a case where there was definite harm and damage that was done to Samantha Markle due to the fact that her sister was in the position that she was in and made statements that she did.”

Mr Ticktin also alleges that statements made in Finding Freedom, a biography of the Sussexes written by Omid Scobie and Carolyn Durand, are defamatory.

He said Meghan had cooperated with the authors and that the “false information” came from the Duchess herself through her communications secretary.

Only the Duchess could have been the source of content regarding her sister, he claimed, adding: “She got caught out.”

Mr Ticktin admitted that they did not have “the strongest case in the world” but insisted that if the Duchess complied with their discovery requests they would have more evidence.

Both the Duke and the Duchess will have to give videoed depositions, under oath, if the case proceeds.

The judge reserved judgement but said she was “struggling” to work out how, under Florida law, the Duchess could be accused of publishing the allegedly defamatory statements.