By Sam Tobin

LONDON (Reuters) – Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN) faces 101 counts of hacking the phones of public figures including actors Kate Winslet, Sean Bean and Gillian Anderson and the estate of late Australian cricketer Shane Warne, London’s High Court has heard. The hearing was held on Wednesday.

The publisher of the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and Sunday People tabloids – which is owned by Reach – has been embroiled in litigation over alleged phone hacking and other illegal information gathering for more than a decade.

MGN admitted that some illegal information was collected in its newspapers in the early 2000s, before Prince Harry and three others were sued last year.

King Charles’ younger son Harry has been awarded £140,600 (about $178,000) after a London High Court ruling that the prince was targeted by MGN journalists – part of his “mission” to clean up the British press. Biggest win ever.

He accepted enough damages from MGN to settle his remaining lawsuit, but vowed his mission would continue and his separate lawsuit against Rupert Murdoch’s British newspaper arm began in January. is going to happen

When Harry largely won his case in December 2023, Reach also claimed victory because two other claimants’ cases were dismissed because they were brought too late.

The company said the ruling means lawsuits brought after October 2020 “will likely be dismissed except where exceptional circumstances apply”.

However, MGN is currently facing a total of 101 lawsuits brought by a number of people, including Prince Harry’s ex-girlfriend Chelsy Davy, lawyers for the claimants said at a hearing on Wednesday.

The publisher asked for a trial in late 2025 to decide whether the sample of 101 cases was brought too late, arguing that it would settle the cases.

Judge Timothy Fancourt ruled that such a trial would expedite the resolution of other cases and said it was likely to take place in November 2025.

An MGN spokesman said in a statement: “Where a historical mistake has been made, we apologize unreservedly, accept full responsibility and pay compensation.”

(Reporting by Sam Tobin, Editing by William Maclean and Gareth Jones)