Rebekah Vardy has burst out crying in the witness box on the second day of the Wagatha Christie libel trial when Coleen Rooney’s lawyer brought up how Twitter trolls had once threatened to rape her two-year-old daughter – as she denied lying under oath by saying she rarely leaked stories.
The 40-year-old took the stand today for another grilling under the glare of her bitter rival Coleen Rooney, 36, who – in October 2019 – accused her of leaking stories about her private life.
Coleen publicly ‘outed’ her fellow WAG of sharing three fake stories she had posted on her personal Instagram with The Sun as part of what she described as a social media ‘sting’ operation. Rebekah vehemently denied the allegation – leading her to launch the £3million legal action which is now in its second day.
This afternoon, barrister David Sherbourne referred to an article in the The Sun from 2017 where Rebekah spoke of the ‘vile’ abuse she had received online – including the sick rape threats against her child.
‘Horrible stuff’, said Mr Sherborne, before judge Mrs Justice Steyn saw that Rebekah was dabbing at her eyes with a tissue and suggested the court took a break. Rebekah shook her head and carried on.
Asked again a few moments later if she would like a break, Rebekah replied: ‘I don’t think it’s going to make any difference, to be honest.’
Rebekah denied the suggestion she was building a relationship with The Sun by ‘consistently’ providing it with exclusives.
‘I’m working with The Sun because they are going to print the story. They are going to give me the opportunity to give my story,’ she said.
Earlier today, Mr Sherborne read out a series of texts in which Rebekah told her agent Caroline Watt to ‘leak’ stories about footballer Riyad Mahrez, the model Danielle Lloyd, and one unnamed high-profile celebrity.
In response, she told the court these exchanges were ‘never serious’ and Ms Watt would have ‘understood’ this – prompting Mr Sherbourne to dramatically accuse her of lying under oath.
Rebekah did admit to sharing a tip about Danny Drinkwater – who, like Mahrez, was her husband Jamie’s colleague at Leicester.
The WAG said she informed Ms Watt he was about to leave police custody because she was ‘deeply affected’ by drink-driving after ex-husband ‘killed two people’.
But when asked about a text where she told Ms Watt she ‘wanted money’ for the story about Drinkwater, Rebekah insisted she was joking.
Coleen was seen furiously taking notes throughout her rival’s cross-examination, while Wayne looked straight ahead, unable to look at her as she gave evidence.
Among the key claims heard at today’s sensational Wagatha Christie showdown –
- Rebekah tried to ‘do the dirty’ and spill the beans on unrest in the Leicester dressing room when star player Riyad Mahrez went ‘on strike’;
- ‘Spoke with agent Caroline Watt about leaking a story about female celebrity ”cheating on her husband with footballer”, and Danielle Lloyd’s miscarriage’;
- Rebekah today admitted to sharing a tip on midfielder Danny Drinkwater’s drink-drive arrest, but denied asking for money;
- She told court she was ‘deeply affected’ by drink-driving because her former husband ‘killed two people’;
- Rebekah spotted one of Coleen’s children without a seatbelt only to be told ”It’s on her private Insta so can’t do anything with it”’;
- Rebekah admitted to directing Ms Watt to look at Coleen’s private Instagram in relation a post she made on the car crash;
- Rebekah denied being prepared ‘to lie under oath’ when she said conversations with her agent about leaking information and receiving payment were ‘never serious’;
- Rebekah revealed linked up with Caroline Watt after joining talent management agency Front Row Partnership (FRP) in 2016 – saying it was a way to ‘tell my side of the story’. The agency also represents Ant Middleton;
- Rebekah ‘deliberately took someone else’s seat behind Coleen Rooney at Euro 2016 match so she could boost her publicity’;
Today saw the toxic feud between Coleen Rooney and Rebekah Vardy spill out into the High Court for a second day after months of painstaking pre-trial hearings.
Below is a summary of the evidence as it was heard in court:
Rebekah ”’tried to do the dirty” and spill the beans on unrest at Leicester when star play Riyad Mahrez ”went on strike”’
Today, the court heard claims Rebekah tried to ‘do the dirty’ and spill the beans on unrest in the Leicester City dressing room when star player Riyad Mahrez went ‘on strike’.
The court heard Rebekah contacted her agent Caroline Watt after Mahrez failed to turn up for training for the second day running.
At the time of the exchange in February 2018, Mahrez was seeking a move to Manchester City.
In the WhatsApp message, Rebekah wrote: ‘Mahrez not turned up for training again. The lads are fuming.’
Ms Watt suggested she contact TV reporter Rob Dorsett, who was one of the journalists covering the story for Sky Sports News.
Wagatha Christie timeline: How Coleen and Rebekah’s long-running, vicious war unfolded before the eyes of the world
September 2017 to October 2019 – The Sun runs a number of articles about Coleen, including that she travelled to Mexico to look into baby ‘gender selection’ treatment, her plan to revive her TV career and the flooding of her basement.
October 9, 2019 – Coleen uses social media to accuse Rebekah of selling stories from her private Instagram account to the tabloids.
Coleen says she spent five months attempting to work out who was sharing information about her and her family based on posts she had made on her personal social media page.
After sharing a series of ‘false’ stories and using a process of elimination, Coleen claims they were viewed by one Instagram account, belonging to Rebekah.
Rebekah, then pregnant with her fifth child, denies the allegations and says various people had access to her Instagram over the years.
She claims to be ‘so upset’ by Coleen’s accusation, later adding: ‘I thought she was my friend but she completely annihilated me.’
The public dispute makes headlines around the world, with the hashtag #WagathaChristie trending.
How it all began: On October 9, 2019, Coleen Rooney, now 36, accused Rebekah Vardy, 40, of leaking ‘false stories’ about her to the press in an Instagram post (above)
Shortly after Coleen’s public accusation, Rebekah – who was pregnant and on holiday in Dubai at the time – denied any involvement (above)
February 13, 2020 – In a tearful appearance on ITV’s Loose Women, Rebekah says the stress of the dispute caused her to have severe anxiety attacks and she ‘ended up in hospital three times’. Coleen says in a statement that she does not want to ‘engage in further public debate’.
June 23, 2020 – It emerges that Rebekah has launched libel proceedings against Coleen.
Rebekah’s lawyers allege she ‘suffered extreme distress, hurt, anxiety and embarrassment as a result of the publication of the post and the events which followed’.
November 19-20, 2020 – The libel battle has its first High Court hearing in London. A judge rules that Coleen’s October 2019 post ‘clearly identified’ Rebekah as being ‘guilty of the serious and consistent breach of trust’.
Mr Justice Warby concludes that the ‘natural and ordinary’ meaning of the posts was that Rebekah had ‘regularly and frequently abused her status as a trusted follower of Coleen’s personal Instagram account by secretly informing The Sun of Coleen’s private posts and stories’.
February 8-9, 2022 – A series of explosive messages between Rebekah and her agent Caroline Watt – which Coleen’s lawyers allege were about her – are revealed at a preliminary court hearing.
The court is told Rebekah was not referring to Coleen when she called someone a ‘nasty bitch’ in one exchange with Ms Watt.
Coleen’s lawyers seek further information from the WhatsApp messages, but the court is told that Ms Watt’s phone fell into the North Sea after a boat she was on hit a wave, before further information could be extracted from it.
February 14 – Coleen is refused permission to bring a High Court claim against Ms Watt for misuse of private information to be heard alongside the libel battle. A High Court judge, Mrs Justice Steyn, says the bid was brought too late and previous opportunities to make the claim had not been taken.
April 13 – Ms Watt is not fit to give oral evidence at the upcoming libel trial, the High Court is told as the case returns for another hearing.
The agent revokes permission for her witness statement to be used, and withdraws her waiver which would have allowed Sun journalists to say whether she was a source of the allegedly leaked stories.
April 29 – Rebekah ‘appears to accept’ that her agent was the source of allegedly leaked stories, Coleen’s barrister David Sherborne tells the High Court. He argues that a new witness statement submitted by Rebekah suggests Ms Watt was the source but Rebekah claims she ‘did not authorise or condone her’.
Rebekah’s lawyer Hugh Tomlinson says the statement did not contain ‘any change whatever in the pleaded case’, with her legal team having no communication with Ms Watt.
Rebekah replied that she didn’t want the story to ‘come back on me.’
Under cross examination from Coleen Rooney’s barrister David Sherborne, she said: ‘It was pretty much unheard of for a player to go one strike and not turn up for training.
She said the story of the turmoil in the dressing room ‘absolutely 100 per cent did not come from me’.
But she admitted that ‘in a fleeting moment’ it appeared from Watt’s response that she was ‘prepared to do her dirty work’ for her.
She insisted the information didn’t come from husband Jamie, Leicester City’s star striker, saying: ‘It was speculation of just bits of information that I had heard and overheard, and also read in the press before.’
She added: ‘Yes, it doesn’t look good there, I was gossiping about things that we already in the public domain. I was just gossiping.’
Rebekah said she did not know whether or not her husband’s then team-mates were ‘fuming’ about Mr Mahrez not turning up for training.
‘It was probably something I was plucking from thin air. It was just a gossip that was all,’ she told the court.
She also said: ‘It was a speculation of bits of information that I’ve heard and overheard, and also they had been in the press before.’
Rebekah Vardy told her publicist she ‘wanted paying’ for information about footballer Danny Drinkwater leaving police custody after crashing his car
Rebekah told her agent she ‘wanted paying’ for information about Danny Drinkwater leaving police custody after crashing his car, the High Court heard.
Reading texts between her and her agent, Mr Sherborne said: ‘You say ‘he’s only just been let out of the cells last night’ and then said you wanted paying for this.
‘To which she said ‘which police station? They will need to confirm with the police station before they write it’.
‘The ‘they’ she’s referring to is The Sun, isn’t it?’
Rebekah confirmed ‘they’ referred to The Sun, but, explaining the comment about being paid for information, she said: ‘It was a fleeting thought and one I didn’t consider any more then when I wrote it.’
‘It wasn’t a serious comment,’ she added.
Mr Drinkwater used to play for Leicester City with her husband, Jamie Vardy, and in 2019 played for Chelsea.
Rebekah sent a message to her agent Caroline Watt to tell her that Drinkwater had been arrested, the court heard.
‘Danny Drinkwater arrested… Crashed his car drunk with 2 girls in it … both in hospital one with broken ribs,’ court documents show.
Rebekah also said: ‘I want paying for this.’
She told the court she was ‘deeply affected’ by drink-driving as her ex-husband ‘killed two people’.
Later, it emerged the story had already come out.
‘Holy F*** … I’m fuming I didn’t give it to you earlier,’ Rebekah sent in a message to Ms Watt.
‘Me too,’ Ms Watt replied. ‘That would have been a fortune.’
Rebekah told the court that was correct but added Ms Watt also included ‘laughing face’ emojis.
‘I realise how badly they read and again I apologise,’ she says. ‘But again these are private conversations between two people… that knew each other’s sense of humour.’
Mr Sherborne asks if this was a joke or serious, and says Rebekah ‘can’t have it both ways’.
Rebekah said in relation to her message exchange with Ms Watt about the Drinkwater story that ‘it was something that wrongly I got involved with’.
She said she apologised and that the ‘messages were not good’, adding it was about something that ‘affected me very badly in the past’.
In May 2019, Drinkwater was banned from driving for 20 months and ordered to carry out 70 hours’ community service after admitting drink-driving.
He had two women passengers in the car and caused £50,000 of damage to the vehicle.
During the exchange over Drinkwater’s crash, Ms Watt urged Rebekah to contact the footballer on Instagram because they needed to find out his address in Cheshire, the court was told.
It was part of an exchange in which Ms Watt explained that she needed more details to help journalists follow up the story, according to Coleen’s barrister David Sherborne.
But Rebekah denied this.
She said: ‘If I did message him, and I can’t remember if I did, I would probably have told him he is a f****** idiot.’
Rebekah spotted one of Coleen’s children without a seatbelt only to be told ”It’s on her private Insta so can’t do anything with it”’
Mr Sherborne asked Rebekah about a message exchange with Ms Watt, which mentioned a picture of Coleen on a school run.
‘One of Coleen’s kids looks like he’s got no seatbelt on,’ Rebekah told Ms Watt about a picture shared on Coleen’s private Instagram.
Ms Watt immediately knew what Rebekah was talking about, Mr Sherborne says, and called it an example of Ms Watt ‘monitoring’ Coleen’s account.
Rebekah denied this.
‘It’s on her private Insta so can’t do anything with it,’ the court heard Ms Watt told her client.
‘She’s such a d**k,’ Rebekah said in one message.
She then denied she was directing Ms Watt to the story to leak it to a newspaper.
Mr Sherborne said Rebekah ‘knew perfectly well’ what Ms Watt meant by ‘can’t do anything with it’.
Mr Sherborne said the matter was important, as yesterday Rebekah told the court she did not know Ms Watt was accessing private information through her own account.
Vardy described it as a ‘mix of words’.
Mr Sherborne reminds Vardy that she agreed yesterday that it would be ‘wrong’ if this was happening.
She says again that they were ‘just gossiping’ and denies ‘condoning’ Ms Watt to leak stories.
Rebekah Vardy hired publicist Caroline Watt so she could ‘tell my truth’
Rebekah has told the High Court that hired publicist Caroline Watt so she could tell ‘my truth’.
Jamie Vardy’s wife linked up with Ms Watt after joining talent management agency Front Row Partnership (FRP) in 2016.
She told the court: ‘She was offering me a way to tell my side of the story. There’s only one way I can tell my story and that’s my truth.
‘I wanted the opportunity to tell my story, about what happened in my past instead of what was represented in the media about me, which wasn’t true.’
A rare laugh was heard in the High Court today after Coleen’s lawyer admitted he doesn’t know who Ant Middleton is.
It came after Rebekah Vardy told the court that she was not Caroline Watt’s agency’s most important client as the former Chief Instructor on the Channel 4 television series SAS: Who Dares Wins was also on the books.
David Sherborne then said: ‘Sorry. I don’t know who Ant Middleton is. You’ll have to explain’ – prompting a laugh.
Mr Sherborne ran through a series of newspaper articles which appeared after Rebekah signed up for the agency.
They included a story about Rebekah’s five-year-old daughter being banned from attending their upcoming wedding by his ex-wife and security being stepped up as England’s footballers prepared to jet out to France to play in the 2016 Euro championship.
Rebekah also signed up by The Sun newspaper to write a Euro Diary after Jamie was selected to play in the squad.
She said of the column: ‘This was an opportunity for me to earn my own money. I didn’t want to rely on my husband. Jamie and I discussed it and there was no problem.’
Another story highlighted how Rebekah ended up ‘jumping up and down like a loony’ after husband Jamie scored the opening goal in England’s 2-1 victory against Wales in their group stage match.
Asked about the piece she said: ‘That’s right, I did. It was an amazing moment.’
Rebekah told Ms Watt to look at Coleen’s private Instagram in relation to car crash post
Rebekah admitted to directing her her agent to look at Coleen’s private Instagram in relation a ‘fake’ post she made about a car crash.
In a January 2019 exchange, Ms Watt asked her: ‘Am I imagining this or did you say yesterday that Coleen had crashed her Honda?’ the court heard.
‘She defo has… Go in the Instagram,’ Rebekah replied, according to court documents.
Mr Sherborne highlighted that on the first day of the trial Rebekah had agreed it would have been ‘wrong’ if Ms Watt was looking at people’s private Instagram accounts through the use of Rebekah’s account.
He put it to Rebekah that, in this instance, she was directing her agent to Coleen’s Instagram.
‘Yes, I am,’ Rebekah said.
Rebekah denied that photos of her and Coleen Rooney together at an international football match were a ‘set up’ following information from a photography agency.
David Sherborne suggested: ‘You were told by those at Splash that if you sat behind Mrs Rooney, you would get good photo coverage.’
She replied: ‘No, not true.’
‘Why does Wayne Rooney look like a potato?’: Social media is left in stitches by baffling Wagatha Christie court sketches
Social media users have been left in stitches by the Wagatha Christie court sketches – with some saying the artists have made Wayne Rooney look like a ‘potato’.
The former Manchester United star and current Derby County manager, 36, was one of those to get the court sketch treatment while attending his wife Coleen Rooney’s High Court libel battle with fellow WAG Rebekah Vardy.
Rebekah, the wife of Leicester City strike Jamie Vardy, is suing Coleen following a much-publicised fallout in 2019.
A court sketch of Wayne Rooney (left) in court today
Mr Sherborne later discussed an interview Mrs Vardy had given to The Sun in December 2016 while she was pregnant.
After Mrs Vardy initially said she did not remember the article, Mr Sherborne held up one of the photos used in the exclusive piece, adding: ‘You think you might recall these rather large images of you naked in a national newspaper.’
Mrs Vardy said they were her own pictures, adding: ‘They weren’t taken for the purposes of this article.’
Rebekah rebuffed a claim that a member of her party had told an FÅ representative to ‘F*** off’ when they were told they were sitting in the wrong seat.
Rebekah texted agent ‘OMG what a c***’ after Coleen stopped following her – then ‘discussed whether the leak of a story from Coleen’s private Instagram about her ”car crash” was the reason’;
Rebekah was asked during the cross examination about WhatsApp messages she sent to Caroline Watt about Coleen unfollowing her on Instagram.
‘What a c***,’ Rebekah said, when she realised Coleen was no longer following her.
Coleen’s lawyer Mr Sherborne told the court about a story that appeared in The Sun about Coleen being in a car crash, written by journalist Andy Halls.
Rebekah discussed in the texts whether this could have been the reason Coleen stopped following her.
Rebekah said in a message to Ms Watt that she doesn’t know how Coleen ‘would ever know that unless Halls has leaked it, in which case please don’t give him the Mr X stuff’.
‘Mr X’ was a married footballer who had an affair with a woman who became pregnant, the court heard.
Mr Sherborne suggested this means that if the journalist ‘has dobbed us in’, don’t give him the ‘juicy gossip’.
Rebekah said that the story about Mr X was ‘widely known’ and there was speculation on social media about it.
The WAG said it was ‘not true’ the car crash post had been leaked by Ms Watt to the Sun.
Mr Sherborne said Ms Watt came up with a ‘lie’ that her laptop had been left with ‘one of the girls’ at her company.
Rebekah – ‘I was ”just joking” when I told my agent to ”leak” story about celebrity ”s******g behind her husband’s back”’
Rebekah discussed with her agent Caroline Watt leaking a story about a woman allegedly cheating on her husband, the High Court has heard.
The WAG insisted she was ‘just joking’ when Mr Sherborne questioned her about what she said in reference to a story about a woman named only as Mrs F – a ‘well-known celebrity’ – her estranged husband Mr H and Mr G, a ‘well-known footballer’.
Rebekah told Ms Watt that she should ‘leak the story about her s******g G behind H’s back’,’ Mr Sherborne said.
Jamie Vardy’s wife said she was ‘a bit shocked and a bit disgusted about what I’d seen in the paper’.
Mr Sherborne asked whether she was so annoyed that she had instructed Ms Watt to leak a story about Mrs F allegedly cheating.
‘That’s the way it reads,’ she replied, adding: ‘Again, in context, bits of information mixed in with other bits of information. I was actually just joking about that one.’
Rebekah denied the suggestion it was ‘standard practice’ for her to leak private information to The Sun via her agent.
While questioning her over an alleged leak of a story about a footballer, referred to in court only as Mr X, being unfaithful to his partner, Mr Sherborne said: ‘That was standard practice, wasn’t it, that you gave information to Ms Watt and she would give it to the Sun?’
‘No,’ she replied.
When asked if Sun reporter Andy Halls was a ‘good conduit’ for information, she said: ‘No, that’s not the case. I never gave him information.’
Rebekah fell out with another high-profile WAG which led to a legal dispute, the High Court heard.
The court heard Vardy had a ‘spat on Instagram’ with Danielle Lloyd, the former wife of ex Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Jamie O’Hara.
Rebekah’s dispute with Danielle Lloyd (pictured) led to ‘legal correspondence’ between the pair the court heard
A dispute led to ‘legal correspondence’ between the pair the court heard.
Coleen’s barrister claimed messages between Rebebekah and her agent showed she was trying to leak information about a pregnant woman who went on honeymoon to the Maldives but went on to suffer a miscarriage.
Vardy revealed the woman was Lloyd but denied leaking stories.
She explained why she sent a message during the exchange saying: ‘She’s gone and done it now.’
Explaining the message under cross-examination she said: ‘She had been on holiday to the Maldives in the early stages of pregnancy. You wouldn’t travel to the Maldives because of Zika virus.’
She insisted she had not had a ‘major beef’ with Lloyd but said the pair had ‘more of a disagreement,’ about selecting the gender of babies.
Rebekah told the court she did not agree with gender selection while Lloyd, who had the opposite view, had appeared on TV discussing the issue.
Rebekah told the court Lloyd had sent her ‘a few irritated messages’ adding: ‘She just asked me a couple of questions about a few things’.
She insisted she ‘was not ‘privy to any information’ on Lloyd and did not leak the story about her.
The court has heard that Coleen had placed a false ‘story’ about gender selection on her private Instagram account saying she had husband Wayne were trying for a baby girl after having four sons.
It was part of her ‘Wagatha Christie’ investigation into who had been leaking stories about her to the press.