Meghan Markle's half-sister claims responsibility after Meghan's father admits to "staging" photos ahead of royal wedding
Although it must have been extremely embarrassing for Meghan and her beau Prince Harry, Samantha Markle has come to their father's rescue. In a tweet she posted recently, Samantha has claimed full responsibility for her father's actions and admitted that it was her idea to get the pictures clicked in the first place.
"The bad press over my fathers doing staged photos is my fault. The media was unfairly making him look so bad so I suggested he do positive photos for his benefit and the benefit of the royal family. We had no idea he would be taken advantage of. It was not for money @KensingtonRoyal."
Even Meghan's her half-brother Thomas Jr. came forward and said that their father will personally apologize to his daughter when he flies to London for the wedding and sees her. He also said that their father is "deeply embarrassed" about the entire issue.
In a shocking turn of events, Meghan Markle's father, Thomas Markle, who is all set to give her away this weekend to Prince Harry for the royal wedding, staged some pictures of him preparing for the wedding with the help of a British paparazzo, according to reports.
Meghan's father apparently worked with a Los Angeles photographer Jeff Rayner, who is famous for celeb snaps, and peddled off his carefully-taken pictures for candid shots, reported the Daily Mail on Sunday. The publication found substantial proof in the form of witnesses and CCTV footage for the same.
Some of the witnesses said they saw Thomas and Rayner show up together and plan out the scenes, which have been represented in the three photo shoots. “They didn’t stay long, probably about 10 minutes,’’ the Internet cafe’s manager, Jessica Anaya, told the Mail. “And they left together.”
There was a point when Thomas and Rayner went to a tailor's shop to get pictures of him readying himself for the wedding by getting his measurements taken. However, since the shop was closed, they enlisted the help of an employee at the neighboring party-goods store to pose as a tailor, while Thomas gave his own tape and asked him to take measurements.
“I just went along with it. I was telling him the measurements, but he didn’t write them down or anything,” said the party-store worker, David Flores. “It was really strange.”
According to reports, the pictures got Rayner a total of $135,000. However, there is still speculation as to what the father of the bride earned from this operation.
The report of Thomas' fake photographs came right after Prince Harry and Meghan, on behalf of the entire royal family, asked the media to leave the Markle family members alone. As a matter of fact, Prince Harry's reps even issued a letter to international media asking them to lay off Meghan's dad, citing the reason that the requests for interviews and photo shoots were intruding on his privacy.
When contacted, Rayner refused to comment on the issue. In his statement to the Daily Mail, he said, “For all the questions, I have no comment. There is going to be no comment, thank you.”
