Kate Middleton’s Topless Photo Drama Resurfaces Amid Reports William ‘Could Barely Contain His Fury’
It was a while ago, but it’s the kind of thing that’s hard to forget. Back in 2012, topless pictures of Kate Middleton, then known as the Duchess of Cambridge, were leaked by a French publication. It’s the kind of thing British tabloids, long known to protect the monarchy, would never do. And yet it happened, and everyone had an opinion. Most of them about how wrong it was to violate Middleton’s privacy like that.
Now, Royal expert, Rebecca English, has resurfaced the conversation in an op-ed for The Daily Mail, sharing that she was actually with Prince William when Kate Middleton‘s topless photos were leaked.
Related: Did William really cheat on Kate?
“When news broke in September 2012 that a French magazine had published intimate holiday pictures of the then Duchess of Cambridge, I had never seen her husband, Prince William, so angry,” English wrote. “Jaw clenched, he could barely contain his fury as they stoically continued to undertake a day of engagements in Malaysia as part of a hugely high-profile foreign tour to mark his grandmother Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee.”
Meanwhile, according to English, Middleton herself, who’d just had her privacy violated, was, “the picture of cool, calm, and utterly unruffled elegance,” to the point that English was left “marveling how she was able to smile, shake hands and make small talk, without the slightest quiver or indication that anything was amiss.”
Prince William would go on to act on his anger. He sued Closer, the magazine who published the photos, for invasion of privacy. Closer ended up paying Middleton $120,000 in damages, with the editor and publisher were fined 45,000 euros each, according to The Cut.
During the trial, Prince William and Kate Middleton’s attorney read a statement from the two that said, “My wife and I thought that we could go to France for a few days in a secluded villa owned by a member of my family, and thus enjoy our privacy. We know France and the French and we know that they are, in principle, respectful of private life, including that of their guests. The clandestine way in which these photographs were taken was particularly shocking to us as it breached our privacy.”
For English, that gets to the crux of the matter of William’s anger, a percieved sense of “failure” to protect his wife. “He had promised her parents when he asked for their daughter’s hand in marriage two years earlier that he would always do his best to protect her—and felt (wrongly, in my opinion) that he had failed,” she wrote. “And it shows how far they have come together since those testing times in Malaysia and their continued strength as a family unit.”
This story is now in the spotlight as Prince William and Kate Middleton celebrate their 14th wedding anniversary by taking a trip back to Scotland, where the two met. And though divorce rumors have plagged them ever since Middleton recovered from cancer recently, if their recent getaway proves something, is that they’re doing better than ever.
