Kate Middleton topless photos scandal: French magazines fined for publishing images of the royals

A French court on Tuesday ruled that the French magazine that published topless photos of the Duchess of Cambridge, Kate Middleton, in 2012 will have to pay Royals 90,000 euros (approximately $1,07,000) in damages.

The court in Paris announced the verdict in the 2012 trial involving six people of two magazines and ordered both Laurence Pieau, an editor of Closer's French edition, and Ernesto Mauri, chief executive of Italian publisher Mondadori (MOED.MI), the magazine's owner, to pay a maximum fine of 45,000 euros ($53,500).

The amount, which the court ordered the magazine to pay, is much lower than the $1.6 million (1.5 million Euros) amount demanded by the royals. The judgement against the celebrity gossip magazine came a day after Prince William and Kate announced that they are welcoming the royal baby number 3.

Apart from them, the court also ordered two photographers from a Paris agency, who denied taking the royals' photos, to pay smaller fines after they were convicted under French privacy laws.

In September 2012, the French magazine Closer published the topless and private photos of Kate sunbathing with her husband William when they were holidaying in the South of France in their villa. After the French magazine, Irish and Italian magazines followed by a Swedish celebrity gossip magazine – Se och Hor – published the uncensored images of Kate on the cover page.

"They are very cute pictures of a loving relationship," the chief editor of Swedish magazine Carina Lofkvist told Reuters in 2012.

After the photos went viral, the royals launched a legal action against the magazine claiming a "grotesque" breach of privacy. Soon after that, the court banned the magazine from publishing the topless photos.

Regarding the case, six people related to magazines went under trial in May this year. Laurence Pieau, Closer's France editor, Ernesto Mauri, chief executive of the publishing group that owns the magazine, Marc Auburtin, La Provence's publishing director in 2012, photographers Cyril Moreau and Dominique Jacovides and La Provence's photographer Valerie Suau were involved in the case.