AMBER HEARD. The American actress has asked for her conviction to be overturned in the lawsuit against Johnny Depp. She believes that the jury made a decision while lacking evidence.
[Mis à jour le 5 juillet 2022 à 10h25] Are we heading towards a new act in the legal proceedings between Amber Heard and Johnny Depp ? The actress seen in Aquaman requested the cancellation of the verdict rendered during the month of June 2022. She had indeed been ordered to pay 10 million dollars in damages to her ex-husband in the lawsuit for defamation which them both opposed.
Amber Heard believes that the verdict rendered is not justified. Her lawyers claim that the evidence was insufficient to convict her of defamation, and that nothing seems to indicate that Johnny Depp lost his role in Pirates of the Caribbean because of the accusations of domestic violence issued by his former wife. Even more surprisingly, Amber Heard’s lawyers claim that one of the jury members, believed to have been born in 1945 according to court documents, appeared to have been born 25 years later, which “raises the question of whether ‘he has indeed received a summons to be a juror and if he has been correctly checked by the court to be part of the jury,’ assures the defense of the actress in a document relayed by the Guardian.
Can the request made by Amber Heard succeed? Nothing is less sure. Indeed, Penny Azcarate, judge in charge of the case and the trial, had indicated that there would be no additional hearing granted in this case. If Amber Heard wanted to appeal, as she had indicated when she left the court, she had to deposit in a frozen account the amount she owes Johnny Depp. However, the actress claimed not to have such a sum. This request for cancellation could thus be the last resort of the actress against her ex-husband.
Amber Heard is an American actress and producer born April 22, 1986 in the city of Austin in the United States. She was raised in Texas with her little sister Whitney in the Catholic religion. She left her studies at the age of 17 to pursue a career as a model first in New York then moved to Los Angeles where she pursued a career as an actress. She first made a name for herself on television and then was welcomed to the cinema. Her most famous role is that of Mera in the movie Aquaman.
It was in the mid-2000s that Amber Heard began her acting career in television appearances. We see her for example in Jack and Bobby or briefly in Newport Beach in 2004. She has already tried her hand at the cinema with Friday Night Lights. She obtained several supporting roles thereafter, including L’Affaire Josey AImes (Niki Caro). Back on television this time with a role that allows her to start making a name for herself: Greta Matthews in the Hidden Palms series on the CW channel in the United States. She obtains the leading role in the horror film All the Boys Love Mandy Lane, a feature film which will encounter distribution difficulties.
In 2009, we see her as a zombie in the comedy Welcome to Zombieland. She plays the role of a woman whom Jesse Eisenberg is in love with but she turns into an undead. We see her later in The Ward by John Carpenter but also in Rhum Express where she gives the reply to Johnny Depp then in Machete Kills in 2013.
It was only from the mid-2010s that Amber Heard obtained roles that really made her shine with the general public and internationally. We see her facing Kevin Costner in 3 Days to Kill in 2014 then, the following year, in Magic Mike XXL where she gives the reply to Channing Tatum. She also starred in Tom Hooper’s 2016 Oscar-nominated film Danish Girl. In 2017, she appeared as Mera in Zack Snyder’s film Justice League, adapted from the DC superhero comics. In 2018, she reprized this role in the film Aquaman which collected more than 1.1 billion dollars at the box office worldwide.
Private life
Amber Heard came out openly that she was bisexual in December 2010 at a Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation party. She took the opportunity to present her companion at the time, Tasya van Ree, with whom she had shared her life since 2008.
Amber Heard and Johnny Depp met in 2012 on the set of the film Rum Express where they shared the poster. From then on, they began dating and then married on February 3, 2015 in a ceremony held in Los Angeles. Their divorce in 2016 turned tragic. On May 21, 2016, Johnny Depp announced his intention to divorce Amber Heard who, on May 24, 2016, accused her of having beaten her and in turn asked for a divorce and sent her a letter through lawyers. Among other things, she is asking for $50,000 in child support a month. Johnny Depp strongly refutes the accusations of domestic violence, following which Amber Heard decides to accuse him publicly. The ex-couple decides on an amicable agreement on August 16, 2016. This consists of Depp paying Heard $ 7 million as part of their divorce. Amber Heard will subsequently announce that this sum will be donated to charities.
At the end of 2018, it was in the Washington Post that Amber Heard wrote an explosive column in which she called for victims of domestic violence to be protected by justice. In this text, she explains that she herself was the victim of this kind of gesture but never mentions the ex-companion who allegedly beat her. A few months after the column published in the Washington Post, the British tabloid “The Sun” called him “a man beating his wife” and was also sued for defamation. In 2020, Johnny Depp lost the lawsuit against the tabloid.
Johnny Depp has also filed a complaint against Amber Heard and is suing her for defamation for the column published in 2018 in the Washington Post. The trial takes place in 2022. Amber Heard was found guilty of defamation with malicious intent against the actor. Amber Heard was also ordered to pay $10.35 million in damages to Johnny Depp. Heard’s lawyer announced that the actress intends to appeal this decision.
The jurors also ruled that the comments made by Johnny Depp’s lawyer in the Daily Mail in 2020 were also defamatory. He claimed that the actress’ accusations were simply “a set-up”. Following this judgment, Johnny Depp must pay 2 million dollars to Amber Heard. In other words, the jury therefore declared that the two actors had been defamed, but it was Johnny Depp who managed to obtain the most damages, although the total sum was much lower than what he was asking for. ($50 million).