The EastEnders actor Steve McFadden has told a court he felt “hunted like a fox” by Mirror journalists whose phone hacking he claimed caused the breakup of his relationship with his partner.
McFadden, who plays Phil Mitchell in the BBC soap, said he was in a relationship with fellow EastEnders actor Lucy Taggart, whose stage name is Lucy Benjamin, for three years but decided against proposing to her because he wrongly believed she was leaking stories to the press.
In a witness statement submitted to the high court in London, he said: “I remember thinking how the Mirror’s power over us always gave them the upper hand. It was like a sadistic game.
“I felt hunted like a fox and they had all the dogs and horses, and it was either play or get ravaged and pulled apart. Lucy and I were always trying to play these games without being destroyed.”
McFadden and Taggart were the subject of intense tabloid scrutiny during their relationship between 2000 and 2003, when they also appeared as on-screen lovers in EastEnders.
The pair’s relationship was plagued by a “permanent state of doubt and mistrust”, McFadden said, because they would suspect each other of leaking stories to the press and tipping off photographers as to their whereabouts.
Ultimately this mutual mistrust proved fatal to the relationship, McFadden said in his witness statement.
“Obviously trust is the cornerstone of any partnership, but particularly so in a marriage, and it was this trust that these Mirror journalists undermined.
“All the articles in the Mirror’s newspapers that were constantly being published about us made me suspect Lucy. I thought she was shouting her mouth off. Now of course I know it was nothing like this and it was the Mirror’s journalists stealing information from our phones.”
Although he found the hacking “appalling”, McFadden said he was relieved to finally know how so much private information was published about the pair’s relationship.
However, he added: “The sad thing is that you can’t turn back the clock on what I thought and accused Lucy of at the time, which was that she was betraying me.
“Lucy and I would have arguments about this all the time and it was a big element of how I would perceive her. I thought she was a big mouth and a grass, which was completely contrary to the way I had been brought up, as my family is very private.
“Of course I know now that I had misunderstood who Lucy was and she was not the person I had thought her to be.”
Taggart is one of eight phone-hacking victims suing Mirror Group Newspapers (MGN), the publisher of the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and the People, for damages.
MGN has admitted that 17 articles about Taggart published by the Daily Mirror, Sunday Mirror and the People, between August 2000 and June 2006, were the result of phone hacking.
McFadden said he “lived in fear of journalists” and would dread every Sunday because of the latest story that might have come out about his relationship with Taggart, who he said was the victim of a witch hunt by Mirror journalists.
Stories about Taggart’s off-screen antics turned the public and EastEnders producers against her, causing irreparable damage to her career, he added.
Also giving evidence on Tuesday was EastEnders actor Shane Richie, who revealed that he did not speak to his close friend and co-star Jessie Wallace for five years because phone hacking broke the trust between them.
Richie said colleagues and crew on EastEnders would say he was “a bit gobby, you obviously can’t trust him”.
“We thought we were selling each other down the river,” he said.
Richie, who plays Alfie Moon in the soap, said the hacking had caused long-lasting damage, including him falling out with his mother-in-law and friends because they suspected each other of selling stories to the press.
Appearing in court under his real name, Shane Roche, he grew emotional as he spoke about his mother leaving him voicemail messages begging him to see his father who was seriously ill in hospital.
“I was the only one there and he was dying in my arms and the fuckers were hacking my phone,” he said, slamming his hand on the witness box.
In confrontational exchanges with MGN counsel Matthew Nicklin QC, the actor said he was taking legal action to find out why he was targeted and what private information journalists obtained but never published.
Asked about the Mirror’s page-two apology over phone hacking published last year, Richie said: “It’s hilarious. It’s a running joke in the industry that when you do get an apology it’s the size of a postage stamp. It doesn’t mean much.”
Earlier on Tuesday, a Virgin Atlantic flight attendant said she felt “completely and utterly sickened” when the Sunday Mirror revealed her relationship with the footballer Rio Ferdinand after hacking her phone.
Lauren Alcorn told the high court that the expose “changed the course of my life” and led to her being kicked out of the family home.
Growing tearful in the witness box, Alcorn said she was shocked to discover that her voicemails had been intercepted over the course of four years: “I’m a very private person. I’ve never ever wanted to be in the public eye – even walking into court today is my worst nightmare.
“Just to know that all my private information has been listened to over so many years, such personal and private information like talking about the death of my father … it’s just upsetting.”
MGN has admitted that three articles about Alcorn were the product of phone hacking, including a Sunday Mirror article in January 2003 headlined “Rio Playing Away” that revealed their relationship.
“Ultimately it was this story that changed the course of my life and affected me very deeply,” Alcorn said. “[It was] deeply, deeply embarrassing to have your private sex life spoke about in such a manner.”
