he libel between the wives of football players Rebekah Vardy and Coleen Rooney took place at the High Court in London for over seven days.
With the verdict in the case now due for delivery on Friday, the PA news agency looks back on the key moments of each day of the trial.
Day one
– The long-awaited trial of the ‘Wagatha Christie’ libel charge begins. Rebekah Vardy arrives at the High Court in London with a guard, while Coleen Rooney is present with husband Wayne Rooney.
– The legal teams representing each of the women set out their cases before Ms. Justice Steyn, the judge hearing the case. Hugh Tomlinson, QC, for Ms. Vardy, tells the court she “had no choice” but to file the libel suit against Coleen Rooney to “prove her innocence and justify her reputation”, while David Sherborne, who Ms. Rooney, telling the judge the case is essentially a “detective story” and “as with any good detective story, you never see anyone with a smoking gun over the body”.
– Mrs. Vardy takes her place on the witness stand just before 4 p.m. and tells the court that she “leaked nothing to anyone”. In her testimony, she says she will “never forgive” Ms Rooney after “spoiling” the last weeks of her pregnancy by accusing her of leaking private information to the press. She also describes the online abuse she suffered after Ms Rooney’s “reveal” post, saying the impact of the allegation on her and her family was “traumatic”.
– The first day of the trial ends when Mr. Sherborne dramatically reveals a News Of The World article in which Ms. Vardy spoke of an alleged sexual encounter with a singer Peter Andre. The lawyer reads the headline to the court and says: “Peter hangs like a little chipolata, shaved, drool, lasts five minutes”. Ms Vardy responds by saying she was “forced into a situation” by her ex-husband.
Day two
– As Ms Vardy’s cross-examination continues into the second day of the trial, she denies the suggestion that it was “standard practice” for her to leak information to The Sun through her agent, Caroline Watt – who spoke out at an earlier stage the case withdrew on psychological grounds. However, she admits that some exchanges of messages between her and Ms Watt were “not good”.
– Ms Vardy accepts that she refers Ms Watt to an Instagram post from Ms Rooney saying she crashed her Honda car but said she was unaware that the agent was monitoring Ms Rooney’s account.
– The modeling and television personality notes a suggestion that she deliberately moved chairs during one of the matches during the Euro 2016 tournament to sit behind Ms Rooney in order to attract more publicity as “ridiculous”.
– Mr Sherborne holds up a photo used in an exclusive 2016 interview that Ms Vardy gave to The Sun, saying: “You think you could remember these rather large images of you naked in a national newspaper.” Ms. Vardy replies that they were her own photos and were not taken for the purposes of the article.
– Ms Vardy starts to cry when asked about some of the abuse she and her family had endured, and she also denies having close relationships with journalists.
Day three
– Ms Vardy denies orchestrating a paparazzi photographer to take a picture of the England players’ wives and girlfriends outside a restaurant in St Petersburg during the 2018 World Cup in Russia.
– The court hears further messages between Ms. Vardy and Ms. Watt discussing a story about Ms. Rooney’s car involved in a crash and Sun journalist Andy Halls, whose phone number Ms. Vardy previously denied but later realized she called him a messaged via Instagram.
– The 40-year-old is again in tears after her lawyer complained to the judge about the way Mr Sherborne was questioned, and is leaving the witness stand after the judge grants a short break. A short while later, another pause is needed after Mrs. Vardy starts crying again during cross-examination and puts her head in her hands on the desk in front of her.
– Ms Vardy is asked about a message Ms Watt sent her in response to a ‘warning message’ Ms Rooney published in which she said someone she trusted was betraying her by leaking stories. In the message, Ms Watt said, “And it wasn’t someone she trusted, it was me.” When asked why she didn’t challenge her agent, Ms. Vardy replies that she was washing her kids and watching Dancing On Ice, so she later continued to gossip with Ms Watt about Gemma Collins’ face on the ice.
Day four
– Ms. Vardy appears emotional multiple times on her last day appearing on the witness stand, accusing her of throwing Ms Watt “under the bus”.
– The former model tells the court that the News Of The World article about her sexual encounter with singer Peter Andre is one of her “greatest regrets”.
– Ms Vardy concludes her evidence by claiming that she felt “bullied and manipulated” as she faced cross-examination.
– As Ms Rooney enters the witness box, she tells the judge that her viral “disclosure post” was sent as a “last resort” after she had previously sent warnings.
– The court heard Ms Rooney was “surprised” by the interest her post sparked, adding: “It is not in my nature to cause abuse or trolling in any way.”
– Ms Rooney tells court she found herself in a “vulnerable situation” following her husband’s arrest for drunk driving in September 2017.
– She says in documentary evidence she was “really hurt” by the leak of information from a later private Instagram post with Mr Rooney that she declined to make public amid difficulties in their marriage.
– The mother of four adds in her written statement that she is happy she has “put an end” to Ms Vardy who allegedly leaked information from other people after trying to catch the person who caught her “red-handed” ”.
Day five
– Returning to the witness box, Ms Rooney tells the Supreme Court that she wanted a “totally false” story about a so-called gender selection process to be published as “evidence” for her covert operation to discover the source of leaked stories.
– Ms. Rooney claims she suspected Ms. Vardy was the source of a story about herself and her husband arranging a nanny, while claiming in court that Ms. Vardy was “fame hungry”.
– Messages between Ms Vardy and her agent about Ms Rooney were “bad and inappropriate,” the former England captain’s wife told the court.
– Former Football Association family member Harpreet Robertson provides evidence about two of Ms Vardy’s guests allegedly being “rude and abusive” to her during a Euro 2016 match.
– Ms Robertson claims that the evidence from Ms Vardy as to why she was behind Ms Rooney in the England vs Wales match – that Ms Rooney and her family sat in her seat and she took the closest to avoid a “fuss” – “just not true” was.
day six
– Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy attends trial with his wife for the first time and hears evidence from Wayne Rooney of an alleged “awkward” conversation with him about Mrs Vardy at the Euro 2016 tournament.
– Mr Rooney alleges in court that he was asked by then England manager Roy Hodgson to talk to Mr Vardy about getting his wife to “calm down”, adding documentary evidence that the FA believed that her media activities caused “trouble and distraction”.
– The court learns that the impact of the period after his wife’s “revelation post” was “traumatic” for her and that Mr Rooney had seen her become “a different mother” and “a different wife”.
– Experts are also being called to testify about data issues from Ms. Vardy and Ms. Rooney’s phones, with Matthew Blackband claiming he believed there was a “high probability” that “manual deletion” could prevent the loss of messages from the device. of Mrs Vardy would explain.
Day seven
– Mr and Mrs Rooney are absent for the first time, as their lawyer explains that they had a “longstanding travel arrangement with their four children”, which was booked when the trial was thought to end on Wednesday.
– Ms. Vardy arrived alone, but left the court about 30 minutes after the hearing started.
– Finally, Mr Sherborne says the case is “extraordinary” for many reasons, adding that Mrs Watt’s absence from the case is like “Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark”.
– Mr Tomlinson tells the court that Ms Rooney’s case is “based on Ms Vardy participating in an extraordinarily elaborate, intricate and devious conspiracy to mislead the court”.
– Ms Vardy’s lawyer also says that his client was abused on social media by thousands of people, including during the trial itself.
– Ms Justice Steyn indicates that she will give her decision at a later date.