Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Wayne had done wrong .. we didn’t know if we would last
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to The Sun to ask if I was OK with it. On the contrary, I made it abundantly clear that I was unhappy about the leaks and they continued regardless.
“I took the view that enough warning had been given and decided to go public. I had never spoken to Becky on the phone before, or met up just the two of us, so we didn’t really have that direct kind of relationship.
“I knew she had a close relationship with the media so I thought if I confronted her privately then she would probably just try to explain it away or pretend to be my friend and supportive, as she had done before, and then spin the narrative publicly.” Mrs Rooney finally accused Mrs Vardy of leaking the stories in a social media post in October 2019.
She claims she offered Mrs Vardy, who is married to Leicester City striker Jamie, three olive branches to end their legal battle.
Mrs Rooney said: “I have sought to resolve this matter amicably on various occasions because I was of the view that the time, money, resources and efforts involved could be better spent elsewhere.
“However, the efforts I made were all in vain. I should add that my concerns went beyond my own posts.
“I knew I could not be the only one whose trust was being abused by the culprit and I now know from having seen Whatsapp exchanges that Becky was leaking information about a whole range of other people.
“When I uploaded the post in October 2019, I believed it was in the public interest for me to make that statement. I still do now. It was wrong for Becky to leak stories about me and about other people for the whole world to read it in the newspaper.
There have been no leaks of posts from my account since. No doubt similar behaviour by Becky was also a real worry for many others too. I am glad I have put an end to it.”
Mrs Rooney was then quizzed by Mrs Vardy’s barrister Hugh Tomlinson QC. Asked what she set out to achieve with the post, she replied: “What I wanted was to stop the person who was leaking my private information. This was my last resort.”
Mr Tomlinson suggested she must have known the social media post would have led to abuse of Mrs Vardy, to which she replied: “No, that was not my intention at all, not at all. It’s not in my nature to.”
Mrs Vardy had told the court she felt “bullied and manipulated”while cross-examined in the witness box.
When Mrs Vardy, 40, was asked by Mr Tomlinson about how she had found giving evidence, she replied: “Exhausting, intimidating.”
Mrs Vardy denies leaking stories and is suing for libel. Mrs Rooney is defending the claim on the basis her post was “substantially true”.
The trial in London continues.