To think Rebekah Vardy has no chance?

[StillCoughingandLaughing]

Her case hinges on claiming someone has somehow hacked her account; be that someone she employs or someone who has somehow done it at random. Colleen Rooney very, very deliberately (and now infamously) stated ‘It’s... Rebekah Vardy’s account’.

She’s suing for libel, yet she hasn’t been personally accused. That wording was not an accident. Surely unless she can somehow prove that the fake stories were not accessed via her account, she has no case?

The whole thing is a publicity stunt. What else have two WAGs got to keep them in the news.

@StillCoughingandLaughing

How does the defence of 'she said it was her account not her' work? Does anyone really think that "...….Rebekah Vardy's account" implies anything other than that Rebekah Vardy was responsible? I'm seeing this defence roundly mocked on twitter.

Of course it implies Rebekah Vardy was responsible. I believe that was exactly what it was meant to imply. But implication is not fact, especially when it comes to the law. Even if Vardy can somehow prove she went nowhere near the account at the time the stories were posted and that it was actually her assistant/PR consultant/dog walker who saw and sold the stories, she hasn’t proved she’s been libelled - she’s proved Rooney’s statement that ‘It’s... Rebekah Vardy’s account’ was accurate. She might be able to prove that she personally is innocent - proving that a statement of fact regarding account access is somehow libellous will be much more difficult.

If Vardey can prove on the balance of probabilities that it was not her that was accessing the account and selling the stories then it is game over for Rooney. She loses and pays £££££ (plus ££££££ in costs).

@StillCoughingandLaughing so why have Rooney's lawyers made so much of what the ordinary person would think was implied by her post, if the implication is not relevant?

Isn’t it strange that the sun’s secret wag column came to an end after this all happened? Hmmm...

Twitter link: mobile.twitter.com/jimwaterson/status/1329420730006691840?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet

They seem very focused on what people would understand by what was meant by Rooney's post.

I don't know who she is.

Vardy isn't as clever as she would have us believe. I think this will backfire spectacularly. I couldn't watch I'm a Celeb when she was on it due to her nasty nature and then the fake tears on Loose Women. Team Rooney - and I never thought I would say that!

Oh I've read @girasol 's post now and am glad to see "I said her account not her" is not the robust defence claimed!

Ok, I actually AM a libel lawyer and while it's entertaining to read people's efforts at guessing the law , the true position is this.

You’re a libel lawyer, yet in the space of a single sentence switch from using the formal nominative form to informal (‘Vardy is suing Colleen’). You also switch to an incorrect spelling of Vardy’s name halfway through your post. Aren’t lawyers meant to understand the importance of attention to detail?

Send me your bill? Two bob and a toffee apple would be extortionate.

CR has proof (screenshots) that only RV's account had access to the fake posts and she said that only RV's account had access.

Another one who’s here for the scoop on what people think will happen with this.

OhI've read @girasol 's post now and am glad to see "I said her account not her" is not the robust defence claimed!

I really wouldn’t take it as gospel.

@LastGoldenDaysOfSummer

I'm disgusted at the amount of money wasted by 2 silly women on such a trivial matter.

Indeed

Think is I don’t think it’s ‘Something so trivial’ at all to Coleen. Constantly having stories leaked about her private life, family and children at first from someone she trusted and then constant lies in the media affecting her and her children and family. Bloody good on her I say.

@unmarkedbythat

Twitter link: mobile.twitter.com/jimwaterson/status/1329420730006691840?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Etweet

They seem very focused on what people would understand by what was meant by Rooney's post.

I think that analysis about prominence is very weak because it does not reflect what seemed to be the overall public opinion at the time after hearing the story.

Most people believed she was accusing Rebekah directly....and that the final prominent line was her little way of trying to avoid a libel claim. It wasn't to emphasise that Colleen wasn't accusing Rebekah directly, it was there to protect herself!

I doubt very many people looked at it and said oh she's not accusing Rebekah at all, she's just saying it was someone on that account.

@unmarkedbythat

How does the defence of 'she said it was her account not her' work? Does anyone really think that "...….Rebekah Vardy's account" implies anything other than that Rebekah Vardy was responsible? I'm seeing this defence roundly mocked on twitter.

Implying is fine.

For slander to be successful she has to have said it. She didn't.

@Amanduh

Think is I don’t think it’s ‘Something so trivial’ at all to Coleen. Constantly having stories leaked about her private life, family and children at first from someone she trusted and then constant lies in the media affecting her and her children and family. Bloody good on her I say.

Likewise it wouldn't be trivial to Rebekah if she is innocent in this.

Thing is, Vardy's solicitors are saying that her agent, husband agent etc all have access to her account. That it is well known that celebs always have a team who accesses and manages their social media. However surely she would have only given the public profile login details to her team, not her personal one. And it seems as though they're talking about personal accounts here.

Team Ronney all the way here though!

@Storyoftonight. Implying is not fine. And this is libel, not slander.

For slander to be successful she has to have said it. She didn't.

She said earlier in her statement that someone she trusted to follow her account had sold stories...so she is pointing the finger at someone...and if not Rebekah then who?

It doesn’t necessarily matter whether Colleen Rooney accused her personally or carefully worded it to refer to her account instead of her - if the words used by Colleen had the effect of lowering RV in the opinion of right-minded members of society, they may be held as libellous. It may be that a judge deems the words to have created that lowering of opinion of RV even if she wasn't actually, specifically accused.

That said, truth is an absolute defence to claims of libel, so CR may be able to argue that since her words were technically true, even if they created an impression which may not be true, she wasn’t libellous.

@StillCoughingandLaughing so why have Rooney's lawyers made so much of what the ordinary person would think was implied by her post, if the implication is not relevant?

Because they need to make a case, and this is the best one they have. Rooney has a better one in my view.

The very word ‘implication’ shows that this was open to interpretation. Vardy’s team has to prove that enough people believed this to be an accusation against her personally for it to be considered defamatory, and that there was malicious intent on Rooney’s part. As someone has already said, these were personal rather than professional accounts. If Vardy can argue that the implication was that she is the media source, Rooney could just as easily argue that she did not expect a third party to have access to a personal, private account.

Rooney only has to prove that only one account - Vardy’s account - had access to these stories.

I'm interested in this.

As @girasol pointed out, it doesn't matter what Colleen said in her post. What matter is what a reasonable person would have taken it to mean.

Remember Sally "Innocent face" Bercow? She lost, big time, because what she was implying was clear.

She said earlier in her statement that someone she trusted to follow her account had sold stories...so she is pointing the finger at someone...and if not Rebekah then who?

What she’s saying is that this was a personal account and she only gave access to people she trusted. Rebekah Vardy was one of those people. By saying the last account standing in terms of access was Rebekah Vardy’s account, she still hasn’t said ‘Rebekah Vardy personally did this’.