The Mancunian Way: Celebs in the dock
19.07.2023 - 18:23
/ manchestereveningnews.co.uk
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The entrance to Manchester Crown Court is the same for everyone - whether you’re a millionaire footballer or a member of the press. Everyone must enter and exit through the same set of doors and everyone must pass through security. It’s a great leveller.
That was certainly the case for Ryan Giggs - a superstar former footballer who found himself in the dock accused of domestic violence offences last summer. Giggs was this week acquitted with the case thrown out after his ex-girlfriend said she was unwilling to give evidence at a re-trial.
His barrister says Giggs now wants to rebuild his life and career ‘as an innocent man’. Though having been forced to confront his much-rumoured infidelities in public for the first time, I doubt he will easily forget his days in court.
For M.E.N. court reporter Andrew Bardsley, it was a rather surreal experience to see a man he had watched on the pitch at Old Trafford standing in a court he reports from each day.
Andrew also recently wrote about how footballer Benjamin Mendy - also acquitted this month for very different offences - would chat to security staff at Chester Crown Court and was a regular in the canteen.
In June, Guardian columnist John Crace described bumping into Prince Harry in the loos at the Royal Courts of Justice in London. “As men do in the toilets we avoided each other’s eyes and went our separate ways. He was genuinely affable, he didn’t look at all upset to have had his morning ablutions interrupted,” the journalist
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