Meghan Markle said Friday that she was “deeply distressed” by the child porn allegations against her dad — revealing that a similar complaint was made eight years ago, explaining why she cut him off from her family.
“I am deeply distressed at the news that has come to light in the last 24 hours, and my thoughts are with any children who may have been harmed,” Markle told The Post in a statement soon after news broke that her 82-year-old dad, Thomas Markle Sr., was being investigated in the Philippines.
“In 2018, a letter was sent to [London’s] Metropolitan Police and Royalty and Specialist Protection. That letter was subsequently shared with me,” she said of the year her father was famously a no-show at her glitzy royal wedding to Prince Harry.
“It made troubling and disturbing allegations against my father and I was given assurances that these were being investigated.
“I hope it can now be understood that, despite certain media publications’ distortion over the years, any distance from my father and my choice to not allow him to have contact with our children was for one reason: to protect them.
“I trusted that the authorities were doing the same for other families.
“Although the breadth of what has now been uncovered is more sickening than one could ever imagine, my sincerest hope is that justice will be fully served and that the priority remains the safety and protection of innocent children.”
Markle did not elaborate on exactly what was contained in the 2018 letter, nor who sent it to UK police.
She also did not say if it was sent before or after her now-contentious wedding to Harry on May 19 that year.
However, the “Suits” actress had appeared happy to have her father walk her down the aisle just two weeks before her big day — until those plans were derailed in a scandal over Markle Sr. staging paparazzi photos.
He then pulled out of the wedding citing heart issues, which prompted King Charles — who was Prince of Wales at the time — to walk Markle down the aisle in his place.
Markle Sr. has vehemently denied possessing such images, branding the claims as “sick lies.” Meghan’s half-sister, Samantha Markle, told the Mail the allegations leveled against her father are “unsubstantiated.”
The supposed hoard was uncovered by Meghan’s half-brother Thomas Markle Jr., who reportedly found “hundreds if not thousands” of images in four boxes in Markle Sr.’s home in Cebu, the Philippines.
The 60-year-old son told the Sun he had been searching for a phone for his Filipino girlfriend’s father when he discovered a 15-minute child pornography clip on an LG mobile phone.
Kids no older than age 10 or 11 were allegedly captured on video and three still images allegedl showed naked and scantily-clad girls of about the same age, the outlet said.
One of the alleged images was a photo taken of the screen of a Lenovo ThinkPad laptop in a room Markle Jr. said he recognized from his dad’s ex-home in Rosarito, Mexico.
He said he was a “shaking wreck” after uncovering the sick stash and reported the alleged discovery to the FBI hotline and the state police in Pennsylvania — where Markle Snr. was living at the time — and the National Centre for Exploited and Missing Children on July 10.
Weeks later, he and a pal moved four cardboard boxes and investigated three hard drives — where they allegedly made further sickening discoveries.
Markle Jr. confided in a pal that there was an “unbelievable amount of stuff” including “on family home movies on VHS cassettes, books, nine mobile phones along with the Emmy Awards [Markle Snr] won for his TV work,” according to the Sun.
He allegedly also said there were “many more worrying items” he’d “never seen before,” including “old books that turned out to be full of naked little girls.”
“His desktop was full of row upon row of thumnail pictures linking to the most sickening child 𝘢bu𝘴e imaginable,” Markle Jr. told the Sun.
“The worst of the worst. What I saw made me sick to the stomach — all this stuff was just dumped on me, and I didn’t know what to do,” he added.
Toddlers and preschoolers were said to have been seen in images engaging in 𝘴єx acts or nude in images allegedly recovered from the hard drive, according to the Sun.
There were also images of a male engaged in a 𝘴єx act with a “very young Asian girl” allegedly tucked in the pages of an antique book entitled, “Lewis Carroll Photographs Of Children: Four Nude Studies,” as well as an alleged film depicting a pair of “naked schoolgirls.”
Markle Jr. “knew right away it was highly illegal and would land me in jail for a long time if I didn’t get rid of it.”
“I felt betrayed, angry and disgusted — and realized I had to report him,” he said.
“I have supported, cared for him and helped him for years — but that stops now,” he said. “I won’t speak to my father ever again unless I’m called to give evidence against him.
