Criminal charges against the paparazzi who chased Prince Harry and Meghan Markle through Manhattan last year won’t be filed anytime soon, the Daily News has learned.
The NYPD, which investigated the May 16 car pursuit, has not arrested anyone nor have they given any names or potential charges against the shutterbugs to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office to present to a grand jury, a law enforcement source said.
Questions about potential arrests were raised Wednesday after a letter written by the NYPD on Dec. 6 indicated that charges could be filed against two photographers who trailed Prince Harry, Markle and Markle’s mother after a Ms. Foundation for Women gala at the Ziegfeld Ballroom in Midtown on May 16.
The letter was part of a U.K. court filing in Prince Harry’s ongoing legal fight to get back his taxpayer-funded security detail.
The NYPD letter indicated that investigators found a “reckless disregard of vehicle and traffic laws and persistently dangerous and unacceptable [behavior] on the part of paparazzi during the night in question,” according to text of a judgment in High Court in London.
Paparazzi were chasing the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, along with Meghan’s mother Doria Ragland, in cars, scooters and bicycles that forced the couple’s team and an NYPD lead car to weave in and out of traffic to avoid crashing “on several occasions,” the document states.
A spokesperson for Prince Harry previously said the chase began around 10 p.m., eventually prompting the couple and Markle’s mother to seek help from Upper East Side cops at the NYPD’s 19th Precinct.
The royals’ claim that the chase lasted two hours in busy Manhattan prompted widespread skepticism, with Mayor Adams saying at the time: “I would find it hard to believe that there was a two-hour high-speed chase.” He later said they were driving around for roughly 45 minutes before going to the precinct stationhouse.
Beyond stating “there was sufficient evidence to arrest two individuals for reckless endangerment” the new filing provided no details on possible legal action against the paparazzi.
Harry has been fighting to get back his taxpayer-funded security but the High Court on Wednesday upheld the British government’s February 2020 decision to make him pay for his own protection.
