Rebekah Vardy leaves the Royal Courts of Justice
(Picture: PA)Rebekah Vardy was accused of lying under oath and “targeted deletion” of incriminating evidence as the Wagatha Christie libel trial drew to a close.
Vardy claims she was falsely accused of leaking stories to The Sun by Coleen Rooney, but faces allegations that she was indeed the newspaper’s source.
In his closing speech, Rooney’s barrister David Sherborne argued Vardy’s case had “disintegrated” over the course of the seven-day trial, as he accused her of destroying evidence that would have been even more damning.
“At the outset of the case, Mrs Vardy’s position was clear. She was not a leak”, he said.
But the barrister pointed out her stance, that her agent Caroline Watt was not leaking stories either and journalists would support them, had changed as evidence emerged.
“It is admitted that on occasions Mrs Vardy did secretly pass on information about others”, Mr Sherborne said, pointing out Vardy’s legal team had confirmed this.
“Strikingly Mrs Vardy seemed unwilling to accept this admission in the witness box.”
Referring to an “artificial slither of a case”, he continued: “As we have seen, that case has shrunk to almost nothing, if not entirely disintegrated.
“Anyone could be forgiven for wondering why on earth this case has been allowed to get this far. As I said, Mrs Rooney didn’t want it to.”
Mr Sherborne suggested to the High Court Vardy had deleted WhatsApp messages and images between her and Ms Watt which she believed would be incriminating after Rooney’s bombshell social media at the heart of the case in October 2019.
He claimed she went on to carry out a further “targeted deletion” in July 2020 after legal proceedings began, but he claimed she did not wipe other suspicious messages because she was unaware at that point they could be revealed in the legal action.
“There is only one conclusion the court should reach, that Mrs Vardy deleted the WhatsApp chats and equally importantly she has lied on oath in her witness statement”, said Mr Sherborne.
“If this is what the court concludes, as we say the court is driven to, there is only one reasons to have done it. It was done to cover up incriminating evidence. There’s no other plausible explanation.”
Mr Sherborne said the destruction of Vardy’s laptop – which she said was broken and useless – should also be held against her, as well as the loss in the North Sea of Ms Watt’s mobile phone.
“The story is fishy enough – no pun intended”, he said, “given how close it was to the date this device was ordered to be served.
“But the fact Mrs Vardy chose not to tell her solicitors for the best part of four months is inexplicable.
“It demonstrates this was far from an accident.”
Vardy turned up to court for the first time on Tuesday, when Rooney was describing an alleged conversation they had at Euro 2016 about his wife’s media activities.
Rooney said the conversation was “awkward”, as he had to suggest Rebekah Vardy should “calm down” and stop distracting from the football.
But a representative for Jamie Vardy said in a statement outside court that Rooney was “talking nonsense”.
“It will not be lost on the court that while perfectly willing to give a press statement when not under oath, he was apparently unwilling to provide one for the purposes of these proceedings, despite the fact he was aware since April 1 that Mr Rooney was going to give that evidence”, said Mr Sherborne.
“It’s very clear the claimant (Vardy) didn’t want the evidence to be tested in the same way Mr Rooney’s was.”
In his written submission to the court, Hugh Tomlinson QC, for Vardy, argued: “Mrs Rooney has failed to produce any evidence that Mrs Vardy regularly and frequently abused her status as a trusted follower of Mrs Rooney’s personal Instagram account by secretly informing the Sun newspaper of Mrs Rooney’s private posts and stories, thereby making public without Mrs Rooney’s permission a great deal of information about Mrs Rooney, her friends and family which she did not want made public.”
He said Vardy has been accused of “being party to an extraordinarily elaborate, convoluted and cunning conspiracy to mislead the court”, but he insisted that was not the case.
Mr Tomlinson said Vardy “clearly and consistently denied being the source directly or indirectly”, and argued there had been “no admissions that she leaked or authorised Ms Watt to leak from Mrs Rooney’s private Instagram or that she knew of such leaking.”
The legal submissions continued in the afternoon with Hugh Tomlinson QC, representing Vardy, saying her libel dispute with Rooney was a “very simple case” when “one clears away the conspiracy theories”.
“Has Mrs Rooney proved that Mrs Vardy leaked the information from her post that she’s accused of leaking?” Mr Tomlinson said.
He added: “Mrs Vardy’s case is and always has been that she did not leak the information nor did she authorise anyone else to leak.”
“She does not know to this day what happened,” Mr Tomlinson said, adding: “She does not know where this information came from.”
He said that Mrs Vardy accepts that it is “possible” that her former agent Caroline Watt was “the source” of the leaks.
“She doesn’t want to be in the position of accusing her friend and former long-term agent of doing something wrong,” he added.
“She sees, as everybody does, the indications that point that way. Her fundamental position is she doesn’t know what happened.”
Proceedings ended this afternoon, with Mrs Justice Steyn, telling the court that she would reserve her judgment to a later date.
