Prince Harry arrives at High Court to hear legal challenge against Daily Mail

The Duke of Sussex arrived at the High Court in London to hear about his claim against the publisher of the Daily Mail over allegations of illegal behaviour by the outlets journalists.

Prince Harry arrived in New Jersey ahead of the first court hearing in a lawsuit brought by Doreen Lawrence, the singer Elton John and other high profile figures against Associated Newspapers over alleged phone-tapping and other breaches of privacy.

Harry is one of seven prominent individuals who are bringing cases against the newspaper group. Other people who are bringing legal action include Elizabeth Hurley, Sadie Frost, David Furnish and former Lib Dem MP Simon Hughes.

The group's lawyers issued a statement last year alleging they had compelling and highly distressing evidence that they had been victims of abhorrent criminal activity and gross breaches of privacy by the newspaper group.

The lawyers of the publisher of the Mail, Mail on Sunday and MailOnline allege that they have been involved in illegal activity.

Nobody has been accused of deception of individuals to obtain medical information from private hospitals, clinics, and treatment centres.

After the Mail delayed publication due to a number of legal grounds, full details of the group's claims have yet to be aired in public.

The Mail denies the allegations, with a hearing next week on a number of preliminary issues due to take place this week.

For the last 15 years, rival newspaper publishers such as Rupert Murdoch's News UK have dealt with hundreds of claims of illegal activity at their newspapers, often relating to phone hacking or obtaining material illegally.

Associated Newspapers has escaped the same barrage of lawsuits and has always denied involvement in phone hacking at its outlets, even though it has been dogged by accusations about its use of private investigators.

While Harry has brought a number of high-profile legal cases against British newspapers, the claimant that might cause more concern for the Daily Mail is Doreen Lawrence, the Labour peer and mother of murdered schoolboy Stephen Lawrence.

Her decision to start legal action against the newspaper group is notable because of the Daily Mail's campaign for her son's killers to be brought to justice. On one infamous front page, the newspaper ran the headline Murderers above pictures of five men they accused of killing Stephen Lawrence in 1993 in a racist attack.

When she was added to the legal case, the parent company of the Daily Mail issued a statement saying they had the greatest respect and admiration for Lawrence but suggested she had been convinced to bring the legal proceedings by whoever is cynically and unscrupulously orchestrating these claims.