See the footage from the inquest

Read the transcripts

The final movements of Diana, Princess of Wales, preparing for the car journey that would kill her were shown in public for the first time yesterday.

Grainy images showed her laughing and chatting with Dodi Fayed as they walked past a succession of CCTV cameras in the Paris Ritz hotel on the afternoon and evening of August 30, 1997. The inquest jury was asked to watch jerky footage from 31 of the hotel’s 43 cameras in various rooms, corridors and a lift at the hotel.

The video began with the arrival of paparazzi outside the hotel at 3.55pm. The Princess was shown avoiding them by arriving at the rear entrance at 4.30pm. The couple had flown in from Sardinia that afternoon.

The Princess, wearing a light-coloured jacket, was shown climbing the stairs joined by Mr Fayed and her bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones. She smiled and turned to face Mr Fayed as they walked to the imperial suite, where the Princess was staying.

The couple disappeared and the Princess did not reappear until 6.53pm, when she and Mr Fayed went out for the evening.

The Princess, still wearing a pale jacket and with sunglasses perched on the top of her head, left her suite shortly before 7pm. She and Mr Fayed, smiling and laughing, descended in the lift and made their way to their Mercedes, at the rear entrance of the hotel. The couple returned to the hotel for the last time at 9.49pm, when they were ambushed by about a dozen photographers. Two young girls looked on as the Princess, now wearing a black jacket and white trousers, pushed her way, head down, through the revolving doors. She and Mr Fayed visited the restaurant for nine minutes before returning to her suite.

The remaining CCTV footage is scheduled to be shown today, alongside a home video taken by a tourist of the Princess leaving the hotel. The jury also saw a reenactment of the Princess’s final journey recorded on a video camera by policemen retracing the route from the hotel to the point of collision in the Alma underpass.

Explore Law

• Columnists

• Law Panel

• Law Reports

• Student Law

Times Recommends

• The best legal yarns this Christmas
• Legal school 'earned £1m by exploiting bar course'
• Axe may fall on 5,000 more City lawyers