Wagatha Christie

Wagatha Christieis a popular name given to a dispute between the British media personalitiesRebekah VardyandColeen Rooney, which culminated in a 2022libelcase in theEnglish High Court,Vardy v Rooney.
In 2019, Rooney announced on Twitter that Vardy'sInstagramaccount was leaking posts from Rooney's private account to the newspaperThe Sun.In 2020, Vardy sued Rooney for libel, and the case came to trial in London in May 2022. On 29 July, the court dismissed Vardy's claim on the basis that Rooney's statements were substantially true. Vardy was ordered to pay a substantial proportion of Rooney's legal expenses, which, together with her own legal costs, were estimated to total £3 million.
The dispute and trial attracted significant media attention, in part because Vardy and Rooney are "WAGs", an acronym applied by the British media to the wives and girlfriends of prominent British footballers. The case acquired its popular name, aportmanteauof WAG and the name of thewhodunnitfiction writerAgatha Christie, because of the steps taken by Rooney to investigate the source of the leaks.
In 2019,Coleen Rooney, the wife of the footballerWayne Rooney, suspected that posts from her privateInstagramaccount were being leaked toThe Sun,a Britishtabloid newspaperthat regularly publishes celebrity stories.To determine the source, Rooney changed her Instagram settings so they could only be viewed byRebekah Vardy, the wife of the footballerJamie Vardyand who she suspected of being the leak,and she posted fabricated stories.The Sunproceeded to publish these stories, which included claims that the basement of Rooney's house had flooded, that Rooney had visited Mexico to "make a baby girl", and that Rooney had planned to appear onStrictly Come Dancing.
In late 2019, Rooney posted onTwitterthat Vardy had leaked the stories to the press. Rooney's tweetwent viraland was dubbed "Wagatha Christie", aportmanteauof the term "WAG"– an acronym for the wives and girlfriends of professional athletes– and the nameAgatha Christie, a writer ofwhodunitcrime fiction. The term was coined on Twitter by the writer and comedian Dan Atkinson.Vardy responded to Rooney on Twitter, denying the claims and implying her Instagram account had been hacked.
In June 2020, Vardy commenced action in theEnglish High Courtto sue Rooney fordefamation.Defamation and libel cases are often not brought to the High Court; lawyers often advise against taking such cases to court because the reputational loss for the complainant is often high.At a preliminary High Court hearing on 19 November 2020,Mr. Justice Warbyfound Rooney had used defamatory words about Vardy. Neither Rooney nor Vardy were at the court.
Vardy argued that the accusation over her Instagram account was false. Following the earlier ruling, it was Rooney's onus to prove Vardy was responsible for leaking stories toThe Sunor to convince the judge that publication of the allegation was in the public interest.Rooney testified that she offered several out-of-court settlements.
The trial commenced on 10 May 2022.During the proceedings, Rooney requested documents related toThe SunpublisherNews Group Newspapersand fourThe Sunjournalists. The judgeMrs. Justice Steynallowed Vardy to use written summaries from these journalists as part of the case.
The judge also asked for the mobile phones of Vardy and her agent Caroline Watt to be searched. Watt said she had accidentally dropped her phone into theNorth Seaduring a family holiday in Scotland.Vardy's copy of the messages were said to have been lost during a failed backup when Vardy's technology expert "[forgot] the password which he used to encrypt the material".Rooney's lawyerDavid Sherbornesaid these were attempts to conceal incriminating evidence.Rooney's lawyers also cited theArmory v Delamiriecase of 1722, which set a precedent stating that any deliberately missing evidence in a case should be assumed to be of the highest possible value, arguing that this also applies to electronic communications.
Rooney alleged Vardy was the source of information forThe Sun on Sunday's"Secret Wag" feature, an anonymous column that discussed the private lives of others.Sherborne questioned Vardy about her history of leaking information to the tabloid press, quoting from a 2004 interview in which Vardy detailed a sexual encounter with singerPeter Andre.Vardy apologised, saying her former husband had forced her to participate in the interviewand that her words had been misrepresented.The trial ended on 19 May 2022.
On 29 July,Mrs. Justice Steynruled in favour of Rooney. Steyn said that Vardy had regularly passed information about Rooney to the press, was critical of missing evidence from Vardy and called her evidence "manifestly inconsistent with the contemporaneous documentary evidence, evasive or implausible" on "many occasions".Steyn also saidThe Sun on Sunday's"Secret Wag" column "is highly likely... [to have been] a journalistic construct rather than a person", and that "the evidence connecting Ms Vardy to this column is thin".Vardy was ordered to pay costs on theindemnity basis.Rooney's barrister at the subsequent costs hearing described Vardy's claim as "probably the most ill-advised legal action sinceOscar Wilde put pen to writ."
Vardy faced estimated legal costs of approximately £3million.At a subsequent hearing, Mrs. Justice Steyn ordered Vardy to pay 90% of Rooney's costs, with the first instalment assessed at £800,000, to be paid by mid-November 2022.The full amount was expected to be approximately £1,500,000.Vardy's legal costs were estimated to be similar, meaning the libel case may have cost her more than £3 million in total.
A specialist costs judge Senior Costs Judge  Andrew Gordon-Saker began the assessment of the case costs in May 2024.The costs claimed by Rooney total £1,833,906.89.In a three day preliminary hearing the Judge found that Rooney's lawyers had not committed misconduct by filing a budget which had lower costs than were now being claimed.At the end of the costs hearing Vardy was ordered to pay a further £100,000 on account of costs to Rooney.
After the trial, Vardy said that she was "extremely sad and disappointed at the decision" and that she had been the subject of "vile abuse" since the trial began.She toldKate McCannofTalkTVthat the media coverage of the case had been sexist and misogynistic,and she was later said to be experiencingpanic attacksandpost-traumatic stressas a result of the trial.In 2023 it was reported that Vardy had trademarked the termWagatha Christie.
In a press statement after the trial, Rooney said that she was pleased but did not believe the case should have gone to court when the money could have been better spent elsewhere.Rooney subsequently described her experience of the litigation as "horrible". She acknowledged that Vardy was "obviously going through it" as a result of the case, but said she could not understand why Vardy had put herself in that position. She has also said she would never forgive Vardy.
The trial received international media coverage.Helen Lewis, a writer for the American magazineThe Atlantic, called the case "the most ill-advised defamation case" sinceOscar Wilde'sdisputewiththe Marquess of Queensberry. Lewis wrote that the trial represented "a clash between different ideas of celebrity", with Rooney guarding her privacy and Vardy "an avatar of a made-for-Instagram world, in which you are a fool if you do not monetise your personal life".The Guardiancommented that the judgment had left Vardy's reputation "in tatters".
The trial has been dramatised in stage and television adaptations.Channel 4broadcast its dramatisation,Vardy v Rooney: A Courtroom Drama, in December 2022.Vardy v Rooney: The Wagatha Christie Trial, a verbatim dramatisation of the trial, was staged atWyndham's TheatreinLondon's West Endbetween November 2022 and January 2023. In 2024 it was nominated for the Noël Coward Olivier Award.Lucy May BarkerandLaura Dos Santosplayed Vardy and Rooney.A two-part TV documentary,Vardy vs Rooney: The Wagatha Trial, was aired in November 2022 onDiscovery+.
In October 2023,Coleen Rooney: The Real Wagatha Story, a drama documentary about the story and court case telling Rooney's side of the story, was released onDisney+.In August 2024, Wagspiracy: Vardy v Rooney was broadcast onBBC Three.