Meghan Markle has won a legal case for comments she made in the Netflix program Harry and Meghan and during an Oprah Winfrey interview.
Samantha Markle, 59, took legal action, claiming that the Duchess of Sussex had told ‘easily proven false and mean lies’ about her during the revealing interview in 2021.
The former Suits actor-turned-duchess told Oprah that her half-sister had changed her last name back to Markle after Meghan’s relationship with Prince Harry drew media attention.
Meghan, 42, also said she grew up as an only child, with little relationship with her half-sibling, who shares the same father.
She had not spoken to Samantha in years.
This was Samantha’s third attempt to sue Meghan for defamation.
But a US judge dismissed Samantha’s defamation case with prejudice after Meghan filed for dismissal – which means Samantha will not be able to refile it.
In a 58-page decision, Florida judge Charlene Edwards Honeywell said Samantha, the plaintiff, had ‘failed to identify any statements that could support a claim for defamation or defamation-by-implication’.
The judge said Meghan’s statements could not be defamatory because they were either an opinion, ‘substantially true based on judicially noticed evidence’, or ‘not capable of being considered defamatory’.
Judge Honeywell said: ‘That Plaintiff used one last name and then the name Markle soon after reports of Defendant’s relationship with Prince Harry were published is substantially true, based on the exhibits in the record, of which the Court has taken judicial notice, and the Court cannot reasonably infer otherwise.’
Meghan’s lawyer Michael J Kump said: ‘We are pleased with the court’s ruling dismissing the case.’
Samantha first brought a defamation case against her younger sister in March 2022.
She alleged her younger half-sister had defamed her by giving information to an unauthorised biography called Finding Freedom, and by discussing their relationship with Winfrey on live television.
Meghan defeated that lawsuit when Judge Honeywell ruled in her favor, saying she had ‘expressed an opinion about her childhood and her relationship with her half-sibling’, the Mirror reported.
The judge also ruled Meghan could not be liable for the contents of the book because she did not publish it.
Samantha promised to come back with an ‘even stronger’ case after the judge gave her the opportunity to refile her claim.
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