The "Wagatha Christie" Coleen Rooney/ Rebekah Vardy court case

[Iwantacatnotcovid]

Is anyone else following it?

Vardy's phone was accidentally dropped into the North Sea... Yeah right!

Does anybody remember the episode of father Ted where they put a tiny dent in the car and then try to knock it out with a hammer and end up wrecking the whole thing.

That's Vardy trying to repair the damage to her reputation in this trial.

Jeffrey Archer and Jonathan Aitken both perjured themselves in libel trials and latterly suffered the consequences, both serving prison sentences. Mrs V needs to concentrate. If she thinks she's got a reputation worth salvaging she should withdraw even now.

its possible that technically RV will win as colleen can't prove its true.

However it is then very possible that damages of say £1 will be awareded (as in the case of Grobbelar being accused of match fixing (or the judge decided being accused of throwing a specific game) and whilst he had agreed to match fixing i think, it could not be proven he threw a specific game.

So he won £1. And mroe importantly in this case, they do not have to say that loser pays winners costs.

So whilst techincally RV can win, the judge can ensure it still costs her a bomb (though colleen also has her own legal costs to bring)

To answer your original question, it's the way libel works in the UK. If I say "John Smith is a paedophile" and then John Smith sues me for libel, it's up to me to prove that he is a paedophile, not for Smith to prove that he isn't. And that's not unreasonable.

The important thing to remember, though, is that Rooney doesn't have to prove her statement beyond reasonable doubt, just on the balance of probabilities. And I think she and her lawyers have done a good job of doing that. It seems clear that only Vardy and Watt had access to the Instagram account - at least I've seen no evidence that anyone else had access to it. The fact that a lot of the evidence has been conveniently lost, and that Watt is too ill to testify, will, I think count in Rooney's favour. A key bit of evidence yesterday from an IT expert suggested that the missing WhatsApp messages had been deliberately deleted. I'm surprised that hasn't been more widely reported because it seems highly significant.

Even if RV wins the world and their wife knows that CR is right

sadly RV will probably be an insufferable cow in interviews etc if she wins

I love that Jamie Vardy/Steptoe pic!

Embarrassed to admit I'm totally hooked on this, RV is awful!

From @RoyalCorgi
'The important thing to remember, though, is that Rooney doesn't have to prove her statement beyond reasonable doubt, just on the balance of probabilities. And I think she and her lawyers have done a good job of doing that. It seems clear that only Vardy and Watt had access to the Instagram account - at least I've seen no evidence that anyone else had access to it. The fact that a lot of the evidence has been conveniently lost, and that Watt is too ill to testify, will, I think count in Rooney's favour. A key bit of evidence yesterday from an IT expert suggested that the missing WhatsApp messages had been deliberately deleted. I'm surprised that hasn't been more widely reported because it seems highly significant.'

I agree it's highly significant and how unfortunate for RV that this witness was called by her own team, was he not? Quite a spectacular own goal. So that's RV's phone that was changed at some stage and her lap top that lost data during a transfer to her solicitor, both meaning the Whatsapp loss 🙄 JV's laptop also apparently suffered some fate or another and on top of that, the Agent's phone ended up residing in Davy Jones' locker 3 days or so after the court had ordered it to be offered up in evidence.

Just how far is the Judge allowed to allow for such a series of unfortunate, and most would say, unlikely, coincidences?

I think it also reflects badly that after WR's evidence that England football management were unimpressed with RV's conduct, the Vardys left court early and took the opportunity for JV to speak to the media denying what WR had said under oath. If he's so sure about that, you'd think he'd have been prepared to issue a sworn statement to the court, through the proper channels, unless it's too late to submit a rebuttal. Regardless, it's in the public arena and doesn't reflect well on the Vardys.

When will we get the results?

Apparently “at a later date”.

I still think the whole thing stinks.

CR posted the stories and only RV’s account could see the stories.

The stories then ended up in The Sun.

CR posted what she’d done and said that RV’s account was responsible.

It just seems like she was being factual. How on Earth did she end up in court over this? It’s madness. I really hope she doesn’t lose.

Just seen Nicola McClean do a valiant job of trying to defend RV on the Jeremy Vine programme on Ch5. But I still don't know how a person could claim defamation of character if their character literally includes selling stories to tabloids!

We'll get the results when the judge, poor woman, has read and considered the evidence then come to a conclusion. It may take a while and who could blame her.

A friend said she felt sorry for the lawyers. I have to say the lawyers are the last people I feel sorry for. They must have made a fortune off this case.

The tabloids say that Coleen and Wayne have gone off on holiday so will miss closing arguments today.

One of the most ridiculous misconceptions on this thread is that people feel sorry for the lawyers.

All the legal professionals I know feel like this is all their Christmases come at once. Just because they're paid to execute professional duties doesn't mean that they can't enjoy a nice messy scandal like the rest of us.

Hear hear, thecats, the lawyers will be p'ing themselves with laughter over this. RV is the gift that keeps on giving 💰

I love the fact The Sun have printed The Vardy’s want to move to American ASAP

Their spokesperson has denied this saying it’s false. Oh the irony and with The Sun.

The barrister summing up for CR certainly paints a terrible picture of RV when all the points of the trial and leaks are categorised in summary. Whilst obviously nothing new, the various points one after another in succinct detail make terrible reading. Not a wonder she left the courtroom.

Agree. Do you think she realised she has done all this and could lose

Rooney does not have to prove it was Vardy who actually made contact with the journalist. If the agent was leaking on Vardy's behalf, that would be enough for Rooney to win.

Yes, the judge can draw inferences from the fact that a lot of information went missing after Vardy was ordered to disclose it.

It was a very straightforward ruling. Rooney's lawyers tried to widen the meaning to include anyone with access to Vardy's account. This would have helped if Vardy had stuck to her original story that her account had been hacked and would have made it easier to win. The judge decided that the ordinary person reading Rooney's comments would have interpreted them as meaning that Vardy was responsible for the breach of trust. Since that is clearly how most people have interpreted Rooney's words, that seems to be the correct decision.

Defamation is all about what the ordinary person reading the comments would think. Rooney wasn't writing a legal document. She was writing for ordinary men and women. It is not in any way perverse to look at her words that way. It is what is required by the relevant law.

Anyone can get representation fullstop. Barristers are required to operate on the cab rank principle. If you work in a particular area of law and someone wants to engage you to work in that area and is willing to pay your standard rate, you must represent them.

No, the fact that she thought she was telling the truth doesn't help. She has to prove that her allegation was substantially true. The fact that she thought it was true is irrelevant.

Libel is entirely about what people reading your words think you mean. You are absolutely responsible for how your words are interpreted. If the average person would take Rooney's words as meaning Vardy was responsible for the leaks, that is how the courts must approach it. Rooney doesn't have to prove that Vardy was the one who actually gave the story to the press, but she does have to prove that Vardy was responsible.

It is up to the claimant to prove their case. Vardy has to show that Rooney made the accusation, that it referred to her and that it was defamatory. Rooney's defence is that her accusation was substantially true. It is therefore up to her to prove her case.

I still can't get my head around how you can defame a person by accusing them of things they have a proven history of actually doing!