The first court sketches for the Wagatha Christie trial are here, showing and sitting next to one another for the first day of the libel case.
Vardy – who is married to footballer Jamie Vardy – was accused by Rooney in 2019 of selling stories about her personal life to the press.
Rooney – who shares four children with football star – shared three fake stories on her Instagram profile that year, ensuring only Vardy could view them.
Her suspicions were then supposedly ‘confirmed’ when the matters made headlines, but Vardy denies being the one who sold stories on her former friend.
Vardy is now suing Rooney for libel, with in London this morning.
If the sketches are anything to go by, the atmosphere in court was frosty, as the women sat on the same row before Vardy took the stand.
Inside court, Rooney was joined by her husband, who sat on her right.
The Elizabeth Cook illustrations show Vardy on the right, with both ladies wearing smart navy blue ensembles.
Vardy gave evidence during the high-profile libel case, giving her version of events following Rooney’s months-long ‘sting operation’, which lead to the nickname Wagatha Christie.
After denying the allegations, Vardy has sued the fellow footballer’s wife for damages over the ‘untrue and unjustified defamatory attack’, with burden of proof now on Rooney.
In her written evidence, Vardy said she believed Rooney had made her a ‘scapegoat’, stating: ‘I believe that they have, in part, done this as a way of trying to change the narrative in the press about Coleen being a doormat following her husband’s drink driving charge and the multiple allegations of cheating.’
Going into the witness box shortly before 4pm on Tuesday, Vardy repeatedly denied leaking information to newspapers, telling the court: ‘I have been called a leaker and it’s not nice.’
Shortly after questioning whether Vardy respected people’s privacy, Rooney’s barrister David Sherborne then asked Mrs Vardy about an interview she gave her about.
Mr Sherborne showed what appeared to be a A3 printout of the article to Mrs Vardy in the witness box before reading the headline: ‘Peter’s hung like a small chipolata, shaved, slobbery, lasts five minutes.’
However, Vardy said that she was ‘forced into a situation by my ex-husband’ to do the interview.
Mr Sherborne later asked: ‘Did you feel particularly strongly about the size of his manhood that it should be made public?’
Vardy replied: ‘It was something that I was forced to say.’
The Dancing On Ice star was also asked to explain what the acronym ‘FFS’ meant from one of her text messages.
‘I just wanted to be clear what you meant,’ Mr Sherborne quizzed.
Earlier today, Vardy’s barrister Hugh Tomlinson QC said she had to bring the libel claim to ‘vindicate her reputation.’
He said in written submissions: ‘The allegation in the post was and remains false: Mrs Vardy had not L***ed information about Mrs Rooney or her friends and family to The Sun newspaper from her private Instagram account.
‘Mrs Rooney did not have the “irrefutable” evidence that she claimed to have had: her so-called “careful investigation” was nothing of the sort.’
The submissions continued: ‘If anyone had been leaking information from Mrs Rooney’s private Instagram, this was not done with Mrs Vardy’s knowledge or approval.’
The barrister also said that Rooney’s alleged investigation into the leaks ‘was in fact a pre-determined blinkered operation with the aim of “outing” Mrs Vardy’.
Mr Tomlinson acknowledged that the affair and subsequent libel case had become the subject of intense press coverage and a source of ‘entertainment’ in the media, being referred to as ‘Wag Wars’.
But, he says that ‘this is far from being an entertaining case, it has been profoundly distressing and disturbing’.
The trial is expected to last for seven days, and it is expected that , with the author and TV star defending the claim on the basis of truth and public interest.
It also thought that Mr Rooney’s cousin and Mrs Rooney’s brother will take the stand in the case that is thought to have cost up to £3million.
