Prince Harry Phone Hacking: Ex-'Mirror' Editor Piers Morgan Says There's 'No Evidence' He Knew
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"I never hacked a phone," Piers Morgan, who was editor of the Daily Mirror newspaper from 1995 to 2004, has claimed
Prince Harry's phone hacking case against Mirror Group Newspapers continues to make news.
On Wednesday, the BBC resurfaced an interview of former Daily Mirror editor Piers Morgan weighing in on the trial and the implication that he knew about the interception of Harry's voicemails while at the publication.
"I never hacked a phone," the 58-year-old broadcaster and journalist who edited the British tabloid newspaper from 1995 until 2004, told Amol Rajan in March. "I wouldn't even know how."
"I think phone hacking is completely wrong and shouldn't have been happening, and it was lazy journalists being lazy," he added. "There's no evidence I knew anything about any of it."
Morgan — who stepped into Larry King's primetime CNN slot from 2011 to 2014 — also addressed the question of whether phone hacking took place at the Mirror while he was a member of the editorial staff.
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"Originally I said, I've never hacked a phone, I've never told anyone to hack a phone, and no story has ever been published in the Mirror in my time from the hacking of a phone," Morgan told the BBC. "And then somebody pointed out, well you can only know the first two things for sure. All I can talk to is what I know about my own involvement."
Morgan, who now hosts the U.K. talk show Piers Morgan Uncensored, also clarified that he only ever worked for the Daily Mirror at the publishing hub — which is just one of several outlets owned by Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN), the organization that Harry is suing over 148 articles published between 1996 and 2010, the BBC said.
While the BBC spot was filmed in March, it is relevant again as MGN offered an "unreserved" apology to the Duke of Sussex on Wednesday for a February 2004 story that appeared in the Mirror's sister publication, The Sunday People.
In legal papers seen by PEOPLE, MGN admitted one instance of unlawful information gathering on the Prince at Chinawhites nightclub in London and that the Duke "is entitled to appropriate compensation" as a result.
The article published in The People is not one of Harry's claims in this case, however, and MGN does not admit any other instances of "unlawful information gathering" in relation to the prince.
Harry is one of four "representative" claimants chosen as "test cases" from a larger group of high-profile figures suing MGN for alleged unlawful information gathering, The Independent previously reported. The other claimants are actress Nikki Sanderson, actor Michael Turner and Fiona Wightman, ex-wife of comedian Paul Whitehouse.
In a written submission seen by PEOPLE, his lawyer, David Sherborne, stated the "unlawful activity, including in particular knowing where the Duke of Sussex was going to be at a given time and the widespread dissemination amongst MGN's journalists of private information relating to him, posed a very real and large-scale security risk for the Duke of Sussex, his family and his associates."
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Sherborne added that Harry "experienced unusual telephone and media-related activity" involving his communication with "over 30 individuals with whom he had close relationships and was in regular contact with, and often exchanged voicemail messages with, including about private and family matters and business affairs."
Though he wasn't there for the start of the trial on Wednesday, Prince Harry is expected to appear in London court for the trial in June. The trial itself is expected to last between six and seven weeks, and Harry will make modern royal history as the first member of the royal family to step up in court as a witness when he gives evidence.
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