Nikki Sanderson had ‘hair set on fire’ after tabloids ‘painted her as promiscuous’, Prince Harry hacking trial told
Soap star Nikki Sanderson suffered abuse as a young woman over tabloid stories insinuating she was “promiscuous”, the High Court has heard – including people “screaming insults” and one incident when her hair was “set on fire”.
The actress, who now stars in Hollyoaks but rose to fame as a teenager when she landed the role of Candice Stowe in Coronation Street in 1999, followed Prince Harry in the witness box to give evidence against Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN), the publisher of the Daily Mirror.
Answering cross-examination questions on Friday, Ms Sanderson, 39, at one point became emotional and said reliving details of stories written about her had been “traumatic”.
She also accused MGN of “gaslighting” in their denial of her allegations.
Mirror hacking allegations court case – as it happened
It is alleged that journalists at MGN titles – which also include the Sunday Mirror and Sunday People – were linked to methods including phone hacking, so-called “blagging” or gaining information by deception, and the use of private investigators for unlawful activities.
Ms Sanderson, who starred in Coronation Street from 1999 to 2005, alleges the information in some 37 articles, published between 2003 and 2009, was obtained through forms of unlawful information gathering.
MGN says her claim has been brought too late and denies unlawful activity save for four occasions in 2004 and 2005, when its journalists instructed private investigators to obtain information about her.
Writing about the impact tabloid intrusion had on her life in a witness statement, Ms Sanderson described “stories insinuating that I was promiscuous” as “very distressing”.
One story made her out to be “bed-hopping and sleeping with three people in one week”, she said, which was “so far removed from the truth” – but the lines between her and her TV soap character had been “blurred”.
Key points from witness statements
- Statements from Nikki Sanderson’s mum, ex-boyfriend, and actress Tina O’Brien have also been submitted in support of her case
- Coronation Street star Ms O’Brien compares media interest to “toxic relationship”
- Ms Sanderson’s mum tells how her daughter became paranoid and “lost some of her sparkle”
- Ex-partner Danny Young, who also starred in Corrie, says being a famous actor “is not all it’s cracked up to be”
Sanderson pictured at the British Soap Awards earlier in June
‘People would elbow me, push me’
Describing “the backlash” from the public, Ms Sanderson wrote: “I was subjected to both mental and physical abuse.
“People would shout at me in the street, calling me a whore, a slag or a slut.
“People would elbow me, push me and, on one occasion, a group of girls even set my hair on fire.”
This happened in a nightclub toilet, she said.
Ms Sanderson said: “I was washing my hands and I smelt burning. I looked down and they had set fire to the back of my hair.”
She also described another occasion when she felt forced to barricade herself in a toilet at a bowling alley after being threatened by a group of girls.
“This kind of thing was constant,” she said.
Ms Sanderson (left) and Coronation Street star Tina O’Brien at the Inside Soap Awards party in 2002
‘Like serial killer dramas’
In her statement, Ms Sanderson recalls paparazzi photographers following her to take pictures while she was on holiday, describing their actions as “creepy, like those things you see on serial killer dramas”.
She also criticises MGN for “hiring random men to follow” her.
“I was a young girl at the time… they could have done anything to me,” she wrote.
In court, she said she felt like she could not “go places without someone watching”.
Ms Sanderson claims MGN’s alleged “illegal activities” have had a “huge impact” on her life and left her paranoid about sharing information, even with friends and family.
At one point, she suspected a Coronation Street press officer of leaking information about her, she wrote in her witness statement – something she feels “awful” about now.
Read more on the case against MGN:
Ex-Mirror royal correspondent gives evidence
Harry’s moment in court is over – was he or the King right?
‘I said that and I stand by that’
She uses the word “abuse” several times throughout her statement, saying at the end that she does not do so lightly.
“These people were in positions of power,” she wrote. “I was attacked by people who were more powerful than me.”
“I said that and I stand by that,” she told Andrew Green KC, who is representing MGN in court.
Asked by Mr Green about this part of her statement in court, the actress replied: “The behaviour has been horrific, the gaslighting I feel has gone on with me. The fact that I’m having to do this today is traumatic.”
Mr Green then asked the actress: “If you consider your treatment by MGN to be tantamount to child abuse… why were you giving an interview to the Daily Mirror in 2019?”
Ms Sanderson said it was a planned piece for Valentine’s Day and later told the court there was a difference with prepared interviews which were under her “control”.
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Prince Harry court case evidence explained
Mr Green showed the court instances where Ms Sanderson would willingly speak to the media.
He said that, “entirely fairly”, the actress needed media publicity “in order to continue to promote” her career.
He also showed the court features including one showing Ms Sanderson posing in lingerie for a men’s magazine.
In her witness statement, Ms Sanderson said it was not “fair” and added “insult to injury” for MGN to rely on press stories and photo shoots she consented to.
Working on a TV soap you “have an obligation to do certain interviews, television programmes and photoshoots”, she wrote.
“There is a massive difference between something you are aware of and in control of versus the defendant hacking into my voicemail messages against my will or hiring people to follow me and take photographs of me.”
Prince Harry’s case has now finished
Evidence is ‘weak’, MGN argues
Ms Sanderson’s barrister David Sherborne previously told the court that the actress only became aware she had a potential claim against MGN after chatting with her Hollyoaks co-star Gary Lucy.
The actress had suspected friends, people working on Coronation Street, and members of the public of selling stories about her, and therefore “didn’t suspect unlawful methods being used” until she spoke to Mr Lucy about it in 2019, Mr Sherborne said.
In response on Friday, Mr Green told the court that the evidence in Ms Sanderson’s case is “weak” and MGN does “not accept that it establishes a case of voicemail interception” nor that it shows “systemic hacking” of her phone.
Read more:
The people named in Harry’s witness statement
Harry’s evidence – watch reconstructions of key moments
The publisher has denied that 35 of the 37 articles involved phone hacking or unlawful information gathering, with one article being not admitted.
MGN has said Ms Sanderson’s claim has been brought too late, but “unreservedly apologises” over four payments made to private investigators which it admits are evidence of instructions to unlawfully obtain her private information.
Prince Harry and Ms Sanderson are two of four representative claimants whose evidence against MGN is being heard at the High Court, alongside Coronation Street actor Michael Turner, known professionally as Michael Le Vell, and comedian Paul Whitehouse’s ex-wife Fiona Wightman.
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Joy star James Norton on the ‘postcode lottery’ of IVF – and playing the scientist who was part of creating the first ‘test-tube baby’
Actor James Norton, who stars in a new film telling the story of the world’s first “test-tube baby”, has criticised how “prohibitively expensive” IVF can be in the UK.
In Joy, the star portrays the real-life scientist Bob Edwards, who – along with obstetrician Patrick Steptoe and embryologist Jean Purdy – spent a decade tirelessly working on medical ways to help infertility.
The film charts the 10 years leading up to the birth of Louise Joy Brown, who was dubbed the world’s first test-tube baby, in 1978.
In the UK, statistics show the proportion of IVF cycles paid for by the NHS has dropped from 40% to 27% in the last decade
Norton, who is best known for playing Tommy Lee Royce in the BAFTA-winning series Happy Valley, told Sky News he has friends who were IVF babies and other friends who have had their own children thanks to the fertility treatment.
“But I didn’t know about these three scientists and their sacrifice, tenacity and skill,” he said. The star hopes the film will be “a catalyst for conversation” about the treatment and its availability.
“We know for a fact that Jean, Bob and Patrick would not have liked the fact that IVF is now so means based,” he said. “It’s prohibitively expensive for some… and there is a postcode lottery which means that some people are precluded from that opportunity.”
Bill Nighy, Thomasin McKenzie and James Norton star in Joy. All pics: Netflix/ Kerry Brown
Now, IVF is considered a wonder of modern medicine. More than 12 million people owe their existence today to the treatment Edwards, Steptoe and Purdy worked so hard to devise.
But Joy shows how public backlash in the years leading up to Louise’s birth saw the team vilified – accused of playing God and creating “Frankenstein babies”.
Bill Nighy and Thomasin McKenzie star alongside Norton, with the script written by acclaimed screenwriter Jack Thorne and his wife Rachel Mason.
The couple went through seven rounds of IVF themselves to conceive their son.
Norton portrays scientist Bob Edwards, while McKenzie plays embryologist Jean Purdy
While the film is set in the 1970s, the reality is that societal pressures haven’t changed all that much for many going through IVF today – with the costs now both emotional and financial.
“IVF is still seen as a luxury product, as something that some people get access to and others don’t,” said Thorne, speaking about their experiences in the UK.
“Louise was a working-class girl with working-class parents. Working class IVF babies are very, very rare now.”
In the run-up to the US election, Donald Trump saw IVF as a campaigning point – promising his government, or insurance companies, would pay for the treatment for all women should he be elected. He called himself the “father of IVF” at a campaign event – a remark described as “quite bizarre” by Kamala Harris.
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Bill Nighy ‘proud’ of new film on IVF breakthrough
“I don’t think Trump is a blueprint for this,” Norton said. “I don’t know how that fits alongside his questions around pro-choice.”
Read more:
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In the UK, statistics from fertility regulator HEFA show the proportion of IVF cycles paid for by the NHS has dropped from 40% to 27% in the last decade.
“It’s so expensive,” Norton said. “Those who want a child should have that choice… and some people’s lack of access to this incredibly important science actually means that people don’t have the choice.”
Joy is in UK cinemas from 15 November, and on Netflix from 22 November
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