No misconduct by Rooney lawyers in Wagatha legal battle, judge rules

Coleen Rooney’s lawyers did not commit misconduct after being accused of “knowingly misleading” Rebekah Vardy by “deliberately” understating her legal costs during their high-profile Wagatha Christie legal battle, a judge has ruled.

Barristers for Mrs Rooney and Mrs Vardy have returned to the High Court in a dispute over how much Mrs Vardy should pay in legal costs after she lost their libel battle in 2022.

Jamie Carpenter KC, for Mrs Vardy, claimed in written submissions that Mrs Rooney and her legal team “deliberately understated” some of her costs so she could “use the apparent difference in incurred costs thereby created, to attack the other party’s costs”, which he claimed constituted “serious misconduct”.

This warranted a reduction in the amount that Mrs Vardy should pay, Mr Carpenter claimed.

In a ruling on Tuesday, Senior Costs Judge Andrew Gordon-Saker found “on balance and, I have to say, only just”, that Mrs Rooney’s legal team had not committed wrongdoing, and therefore it was “not an appropriate case” to reduce the amount of money that Mrs Vardy should pay.

He said that while there was a “failure to be transparent”, it was not “sufficiently unreasonable or improper” to constitute misconduct.

In 2019, Mrs Rooney, the wife of former Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney, accused Mrs Vardy of leaking her private information to the press on social media, which Mrs Justice Steyn found in July 2022 was “substantially true”.

The judge later ordered Mrs Vardy, the wife of Leicester City striker Jamie Vardy, to pay 90% of Mrs Rooney’s costs, including an initial payment of £800,000.

But the latest hearing in London was told that Mrs Rooney’s claimed legal bill – £1,833,906.89 – was more than three times her “agreed costs budget of £540,779.07”, which Mr Carpenter said was “disproportionate”.

He continued that the earlier “understatement” of some costs was “improper and unreasonable” and “involved knowingly misleading Mrs Vardy and the court”.

Mr Dunne said that the argument that the amount owed should be reduced was “misconceived” and that the budget was “not designed to be an accurate or binding representation” of her overall legal costs.

He said: “Mrs Vardy’s argument appears to arise from her frustration that her deplorable conduct in this litigation has led to the budgets becoming irrelevant.”

He continued: “Had Mrs Vardy conducted this matter in a reasonable fashion, Mrs Rooney would be confined to her budget and would have recovered no more absent good reason.

The hearing is dealing with points of principle before a line-by-line assessment of costs, which will take place at a later date.

Neither Mrs Vardy nor Mrs Rooney attended court on Tuesday, and the hearing will conclude on Wednesday.