Soap actress Nikki Sanderson became emotional as she completed her High Court phone hacking trial, saying it had been “humiliating” and “a horrific experience from the start to the end”.
The Coronation Street and Hollyoaks star, 39, is suing Mirror Group Newspapers alongside Prince Harry and her former co-star Michael Le Vell over alleged phone hacking and unlawful newsgathering.
Over two days of evidence, the actress was forced to revisit tabloid stories of her relationship with co-star Danny Young, she was quizzed over her decision to pose in lingerie for men’s magazines, and she described her fear at being pursued by paparazzi.
Concluding her evidence, Sanderson was asked by her barrister David Sherborne how being in the witness box for a day-and-a-half had felt.
Appearing tearful, after a short pause the star replied: “Humiliating.”
She continued: “Some of it’s really embarrassing,” adding that other parts of it were “traumatising”.
“No one wants to be in the witness box feeling as if you’re on trial,” she added.
She said she had felt isolated over the weekend, when in the middle of her evidence and ordered by the judge not to speak to anyone about the case.
“It’s been a horrific experience from the start to the end“, she added.
During her second day of evidence, Sanderson told the High Court it was her human right to pose for a men’s magazine as she hit out at her tabloid newspaper portrayal as a “party girl” and the paparazzi’s pursuit of her.
She was quizzed about stories in the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror, and The People about her daily life, holidays, and relationship with Mr Young.
She says paparazzi attention was “creepy”, comparing photographer behaviour to serial killers as they pursued her for details of “even the most mundane details about my life”.
On a May 2005 article about her night out at the Embassy Club in Mayfair, Sanderson told the court she believes the newspaper was “trying to make me look bad”.
“I do object to being portrayed as a ‘party girl’”, she said.
“I’m allowed to go to parties and have a good time, rather than being a ‘party girl’, and that’s all I did.”
Sanderson complains about an “unflattering” paparazzi photo of her and Mr Young on a beach in the Caribbean, as well as regular “surveillance” of her daily life.
Andrew Green KC, representing MGN, showed the court a lingerie photoshoot the actress did with Maxim magazine, suggesting the newspaper pictures of her are not more intrusive.
“This sort of article is something I consented to”, she replied, of the magazine shoot.
“If I want to do a photoshoot, it should be within my human rights to be able to do it. It is my choice to do it, I’ve given consent, and I have control over it.”
Asked if her complaint is about not giving her consent to be photographed in public, she replied: “Isn’t consent a legal right? Consent to your own image, who I see, where I go, what I do. Couldn’t I have that right of consent?”
Sanderson said she has discussed the “sexualised” nature of underwear photoshoots in the media in the past, but insisted she had “chosen” the magazine work and had “been in control on the day”.
The actress, who played Candice Stowe on Coronation Street and is Maxine Minniver on Hollyoaks, has complained about “frightening” surveillance from newspapers, including as she shopped for underwear at La Senza, at Covent Garden, stopped into WHSmith, bought handbags in Selfridges.
“To you it might seem trivial, but to me I know I’m being watched and followed”, she told Mr Green.
“You know you are being followed and people are surveilling you, which is frightening.”
Sanderson also told the court she felt a story about her possibly appearing as a contestant on I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! may have harmed her career.
“Some casting directors probably wouldn’t see people who have been on these shows”, she said.
“It depends on the casting directors and how they feel about reality TV.”
She also said she had been very keen to appear on Strictly Come Dancing, but fears her chances were scuppered by reporting of her name as a possible contestant.
Sanderson said the BBC show likes a “big reveal” of its line-up, and and bosses "could have been put off wanting me to audition for it" when her name was publicly reported.
In another story, the actress was touted as a possible singing talent reported as the “new Kylie”.
Sanderson said she had talks about a singing career, but insisted the 2005 Sunday Mirror story was damaging to her career despite being largely complimentary about her talents.
“When I left Corrie, people assumed that it was because I wanted to do bigger and better things, which wasn’t true, but people had opinions about this anyway”, she said.
“I always enjoyed singing but I was never going to be a big popstar, so when the papers made it sound like I was going to be the next big thing, the next Kylie, and then nothing happened, it made it look like I’d failed.
“People presumed that I had failed, and I hadn’t done it because I wasn’t good enough, and I received a lot of negative comments about this.
“Mean comments are never easy to deal with but being young and having to deal with that is hugely impactful and it has shaped me as a person going forward.”
MGN has apologised to Sanderson over four instances of unlawful newsgathering. But it denies illegality over the majority of stories in the case, and denies phone hacking.
The trial continues.
