Any leaked details ‘not new’, libel trial is told

REBEKAH VARDY INDICATES THAT AGENT DID PASS ON STORIES TO SUN NEWSPAPER

REBEKAH Vardy appeared to accept that her agent leaked information from Coleen Rooney’s private Instagram account to a newspaper, but denied it was “new” information, as she continued to give evidence at the High Court in London.

During her third day in the witness box as part of her high-profile libel claim against Mrs Rooney, Mrs Vardy, 40, also told the court she did not reply to her agent Caroline Watt when she allegedly admitted leaking stories to The Sun in a WhatsApp chat.

Mrs Vardy said she was bathing her children at the time, and that her next message to Ms Watt was about “Gemma Collins faceplanting” on the television show Dancing On Ice.

Yesterday, Mrs Vardy entered the witness box for the third time on what was expected to be the final day of her evidence in what has been dubbed the “Wagatha Christie” case.

In a viral social media post in October 2019, Mrs Rooney, 36, said she had carried out a “sting operation” and accused Mrs Vardy of leaking “false stories” about her to the press.

Mrs Vardy, who is married to Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy, denies leaking stories to the media and is suing her fellow footballer’s wife for libel, while Mrs Rooney is defending the claim on the basis her post was “substantially true”.

Yesterday, the court heard one of the articles in the case concerned Mrs Rooney’s car being damaged in early 2019, with a picture of the damaged Honda being posted on her private Instagram account.

A story was published in The Sun about Mrs Rooney’s car three days later, written by journalist Andy Halls.

Mrs Rooney’s barrister, David Sherborne, read out texts between Mrs Vardy and Ms Watt, where the latter told her: “I would have tried to have done a story on Coleen but the evidence has been deleted.”

The court was told Ms Watt continued: “Halls is trying to do a story on Coleen crashing her car but her PR won’t even reply. I’ve told him I’m 100 per cent confident that it happened but don’t know how.”

Questioning Mrs Vardy, Mr Sherborne said: “You didn’t object at any stage to the fact that Ms Watt is plainly passing on information from Mrs Rooney’s private Instagram account to Andy Halls?”

Mrs Vardy said The Sun already had the information, adding: “I didn’t think she was passing on any new information.”

Mr Sherborne asked: “Take the word new out of it. Did you or did you not know that Ms Watt was passing on information from Mrs Rooney’s private account?”