Piers Morgan sues Earl Spencer over Diana book claims

Piers Morgan sues Earl Spencer over Diana book claims

Morgan challenges Diana memoir over disputed 1993 gym-photo account

The latest battle surrounding Princess Diana has moved from the royal family to the courtroom, with Piers Morgan threatening legal action against her brother, Earl Spencer, over claims made about him in Spencer’s explosive new memoir.

Morgan says he is taking action against Spencer and publisher Penguin Random House over what he describes as “demonstrable lies” in Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, which has just been released.

The 1993 timeline

At the heart of the dispute is one of the most notorious episodes in Diana's troubled relationship with the press — secretly taken photographs of her exercising at a London gym in 1993.

The photographs were published by the Sunday Mirror in November that year and became the subject of a major privacy dispute involving Diana and Mirror Group Newspapers.

Spencer revisits the episode in his memoir and links Morgan to the controversy, suggesting that the journalist may have felt guilty about the publication of the pictures.

But Morgan says the chronology makes that claim impossible.

He points out that he did not join the Daily Mirror until October 1995 — almost two years after the photographs appeared. At the time, he says, he was working as a showbusiness columnist for The Sun, the Mirror's rival.

“Very easy” to prove, says Morgan

Morgan has acknowledged that he is no “journalistic angel”, but insists that Spencer has got this particular part of the story completely wrong.

Earl Spencer

On Piers Morgan Uncensored, he described the account as “bullshit” and said the newspaper timeline was straightforward to establish.

He is demanding that the disputed material be removed from the book and has also called for a donation to the King's Trust.

The Standard reported that Morgan had announced legal action against both Spencer and the publishers, while Sky News described the move as a threat to sue over what Morgan called a “complete lie”.

But this is bigger than Morgan

The legal threat is only the latest explosion from a book that has already reopened some of the most painful chapters in the Royal Family's history.

Spencer's memoir contains a series of controversial claims about Diana, her marriage to Charles and the aftermath of her death. His account has also prompted an unusually direct response from Buckingham Palace, which said grief can affect judgement and memory.

Morgan's dispute therefore lands in the middle of a much wider argument over who gets to tell the story of Diana — her family, the Royal Family or the newspapers that followed her every move.

The extraordinary twist

There is an irony at the centre of the latest row.

Spencer's book is intended to put his own memories and version of Diana's story on the record. But one of its most public battles is now about whether a basic piece of newspaper history — who worked where and when — has been accurately remembered.

Morgan says the answer is no.

And now he says Earl Spencer and his publishers will be hearing from his lawyers.

AN ORIGINAL SOURCES: IBT. Independent. The Standard. Sky. Yahoo News