PAThe so-called Wagatha Christie dispute has returned to the High Court, with Rebecca Vardy challenging the “significant extent” of Coleen Rooney’s claim for legal costs in her 2022 libel trial.
Mrs Vardy lost her legal battle after a judge ruled it was “substantially true” that Mrs Vardy leaked Mrs Rooney’s private information to the media.
The judge ordered her to pay 90% of Mrs Rooney’s costs, which were initially said to be less than £1.7m. Mrs Vardy’s lawyers said Mrs Rooney now claims her legal costs exceed £1.8m, including some “extraordinary” costs.
Mrs Rooney’s lawyers argued the costs could have been lower had Mrs Vardy “conducted this litigation properly”.
“Kitchen Sink Method”
Jamie Carpenter KC, for Mrs Vardy, said Mrs Rooney’s total costs included a lawyer “staying at the Nobu Hotel, incurring substantial dinner and drink charges and minibar charges” .
He said in written submissions to Monday’s hearing: “The sheer magnitude of Mrs Rooney’s claimed costs and the sheer number of errors in her bills compared with her agreed cost estimate make costs disputes particularly difficult. And all Some of the expenses claimed are peculiar.
Mr Carpenter added that the bill “had not been drafted with sufficient care” and “took a ‘kitchen sink’ approach” by including “more than £120,000 of costs that Mrs Rooney was not entitled to bear”.
However, Robin Dunne, representing Mrs Rooney, said Mrs Vardy chose to launch defamation proceedings “despite knowing the Instagram posts were true” and that she had displayed “deplorable conduct” in the case. .
He wrote: “Mrs Vardy has refused to engage with Mrs Rooney in an attempt to avoid these proceedings and her actions have meant that Mrs Rooney has been required to incur substantial additional costs.”
He continued: “Mrs Vardy now claims that Mrs Rooney’s costs were unreasonable, a large proportion of which were directly caused by her behaviour, which is unreasonable in her mouth.”
Neither Mrs Rooney nor Mrs Vardy attended the hearing before senior costs judge Andrew Gordon-Sackell on Monday. The meeting ends on Wednesday.
detective work
Mrs Rooney, the wife of former England captain Wayne Rooney, who was nicknamed “Wagatha Christie” in 2019, previously said she carried out a sting operation to find out who sent messages from her private Instagram The Sun leaked the story about her. She concluded: “This is… Rebecca Vardy’s account.”
The post led to Mrs Vardy, the wife of Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy, suing her for libel and sparked considerable interest when the case was heard in court two years ago.
Judge Steyn ruled Mrs Rooney’s allegations were “substantially true” and said Mrs Vardy was likely “aware of, condoned and actively participated” in working with Mrs Vardy’s agent Caroline to leak information about Mrs Rooney to The Sun. The process of the story.
Mrs Rooney called the trial “horrible” in an interview with British Vogue last year.
She suggested she could not forgive Mrs Vardy for her libelous accusations but said “relief is everything in victory”.
After losing the case, Mrs Vardy went on to trademark the term “Wagatha Christie”.
