Rebekah Vardy has hit out at Coleen Rooney in a scathing Instagram rant after she was told she would need to pay 90 per cent of her legal fees by next month, following the ' Wagatha Christie ' libel case. The WAG went on to brand the situation a "whole embarrassing spectacle" as she opened up on Instagram.
Jamie Vardy's wife shared a photo of a charity money jar alongside a quote from a newspaper, which, referring to Coleen, reads: "She'd be far happier to see the money they would have spent on lawyers being used in a more positive and productive way."
Rebekah then penned: "Let's hope you put your money where your mouth is and some good can come from this whole embarrassing spectacle!" She also tagged Coleen's Instagram handle in the post.
She also posted another quote to her Instagram which read: "It's always the ones with the dirty hands pointing the fingers." Back in July, Mrs Vardy, 40, lost her high-profile libel claim against Mrs Rooney, 36, when Mrs Justice Steyn ruled that Mrs Rooney's viral social media post accusing Mrs Vardy of leaking her private information to the press was "substantially true".
In an order made public today, the judge ruled that Mrs Vardy should pay 90 per cent of Mrs Rooney's costs. In a statement, Mrs Justice Steyn stated the total legal bill which Coleen is yet to finalise with the court but was estimated by Coleen's lawyer, Paul Lunt, is estimated to be around £1.66million.
But Mrs Justice Steyn explained that she had done "the best" she can to "estimate the likely level of recovery" but while bearing in mind that the defendant had not yet produced a bill, the cost would be around £800,000. She wrote of Rebekah's action: "The claim has been dismissed. The defendant succeeded in establishing that the essence of the libel was substantially true."
A court document obtained by The Mirror revealed that Coleen wanted 100 per cent of her legal fees reimbursed but Rebekah wanted to pay the sum of 80 per cent after the judge had found in her favour for several matters disputed at the trial. The document goes on to state that the defendant had originally sought payment of £1.25million but this figure was later dropped to £ 1 million.
Rebekah (claimant) contends that the payment should be £361,174 if it was to total 80 per cent of the costs or £451,468 if all of the costs are to be paid on a standard basis. Should this turn to an indemnity basis, the claimant should be ordered to pay £726,000 – inclusive of VAT.
However, Vardy argued that she should not be made to pay the full costs due to three matters during which she was successful including that of the 'Secret WAG' newspaper column. She also argued that Coleen's "Reveal Post" caused serious harm and argued against Coleen's claim that the post was in the public interest.
A statement from Coleen's lawyer, Paul Lunt at Brabners issued to The Mirror, read: "The High Court has today decided that Rebekah Vardy must pay Coleen Rooney's legal costs on an indemnity basis - the highest basis that the Court could order. "The reasoning given for this decision is that there was a finding at trial that Rebekah Vardy had deliberately deleted or destroyed evidence. That behaviour falls outside the ordinary and reasonable conduct expected of a party in legal proceedings.
"This followed a separate finding regarding the loss of evidence that was in the possession of Rebekah Vardy's former agent, Caroline Watt. "Coleen's pursuit of that evidence is a major reason why her legal costs increased substantially from the original estimates given to the court long before the start of the trial.
"Rebekah Vardy has been ordered to pay £800,000 to Coleen Rooney by 15 November as an interim payment until the final total she must pay is either agreed or decided upon by the court. Naturally, Rebekah will also be responsible for her own legal costs of bringing her failed libel action against Coleen.
"Today's decision also makes Rebekah liable to pay for legal costs incurred by certain journalists from News UK, publishers of The Sun newspaper, following her unsuccessful efforts to involve them in the proceedings."
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