Depp v. Heard
Court	Fairfax County Circuit Court
Full case name	John C. Depp, II v. Amber Laura Heard
Started	April 11, 2022 (2022-04-11)
Decided	June 1, 2022 (2022-06-01)
Verdict	Depp's complaint: Heard found liable in three of all three matters of defamation raised. Depp awarded $10 million (of the $50 million claim) in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages (reduced to $350,000 per state law limit). Heard's counterclaims: Depp found liable in one of three matters of defamation raised. Heard awarded $2 million (of the $100 million claim) in compensatory damages.
Court membership
Judge(s) sitting	Penney S. Azcarate[1]

John C. Depp, II v. Amber Laura Heard (CL-2019-2911) was a civil defamation trial between two American actors that took place in Fairfax County, Virginia, from 11 April to 1 June 2022. Plaintiff Johnny Depp alleged three counts^[a] of defamation against defendant Amber Heard, claiming $50 million in damages;^[2] Heard filed with counterclaims^[b] against Depp, claiming damages of $100 million.^[3]

The actors, who married in February 2015,^[4] divorced after Heard claimed in May 2016 that Depp had abused her physically,^[5] which he denied.^[6] In a separate libel trial, Depp v News Group Newspapers Ltd in July 2020, the presiding judge concluded that "the great majority of alleged assaults of Ms Heard by Mr Depp have been proved to the civil standard".^[7][8] Several legal experts suggested that Depp had a smaller chance of winning in the US trial compared to the UK trial.^[9][10]

The Virginia trial centered on a December 2018 op-ed by Heard, published in The Washington Post, in which she stated that she had spoken up against "sexual violence" and become "a public figure representing domestic abuse".^[11] Depp's complaint of defamation blamed Heard's op-ed for damaging his reputation and career and causing him extensive financial loss.^[2] Heard's counterclaims included allegations that a lawyer of Depp's had defamed her in statements published in the Daily Mail in 2020.^[3] Throughout the trial, Depp's legal team sought to disprove Heard's abuse allegations and to demonstrate that she had been the instigator, rather than the victim, of intimate partner violence. Heard's lawyers defended the op-ed, claiming it was factual and protected by the First Amendment. The livestreamed trial attracted large numbers of viewers as well as considerable social media commentary, the majority of which was sympathetic to Depp and critical of Heard. In the United States, news articles about the case generated high levels of social media interaction and renewed debates around topics relating to domestic violence, the #MeToo movement, and women's rights.^{[12][13][14][15]}

The jury ruled that Heard's op-ed references to "sexual violence" and "domestic abuse" were false and defamed Depp with actual malice, awarding him $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages from Heard^[16][17] although the court reduced the punitive damages to $350,000 due to a limit imposed by Virginia state law.^[18] The jury also ruled that Waldman had defamed Heard by falsely alleging that she and her friends "roughed up" Depp's penthouse as part of a "hoax" against Depp. The jury awarded Heard $2 million in compensatory damages and zero in punitive damages from Depp.^[17][16] Separately, the jury ruled that Waldman's other allegations of Heard's "sexual violence hoax" and "abuse hoax" against Depp had not been proven to be defamatory.^[17]

Background

Depp and Heard's relationship

Johnny Depp (left) and Amber Heard (right)

Actors Johnny Depp and Amber Heard met in 2009 while filming The Rum Diary; according to Heard, their relationship began "around the end of 2011 or early 2012".^[4] They got engaged in January 2014 and married on Depp’s private island in the Bahamas in February 2015.^[19] Heard filed for divorce on May 23, 2016, and obtained a temporary restraining order against Depp.^[20][21][22] In response, he alleged that she was "attempting to secure a premature financial resolution by alleging abuse".^[11] Heard testified about the alleged abuse at a deposition during their divorce litigation, alleging that Depp had been "verbally and physically abusive" throughout their relationship, usually while under the influence of alcohol or drugs.^[23] The divorce received much publicity, with images of Heard's alleged injuries published by the media.^[24]

A settlement was reached in August 2016, and the divorce was finalized in January 2017.^[25] Heard withdrew the restraining order, and she and Depp released a joint statement stating that their relationship was "intensely passionate and periodically volatile, but always bound by love. Neither party has made false accusations for financial gain. There was never any intent of physical or emotional harm."^[11]

Depp paid Heard a divorce settlement of $7 million, which she pledged to donate to the American Civil Liberties Union and the Children's Hospital Los Angeles.^[26][27] The settlement included a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) preventing either party from discussing their relationship publicly.^[28]

Depp v News Group Newspapers Ltd

In April 2018, UK tabloid The Sun published an article titled "GONE POTTY How Can J K Rowling be 'genuinely happy' casting Johnny Depp in the new Fantastic Beasts film after assault claim?",^[29] which originally described Depp as a "wife beater" in its online title.^[c][11][30] In June 2018, Depp sued News Group Newspapers, the publisher of The Sun, and then executive editor Dan Wootton for libel.^[11][30] Both Depp and Heard testified in the July 2020 trial, which focused on evaluating 14 alleged incidents of abuse.^[31][32] In November 2020, judge Andrew Nicol ruled in favor of the publisher as the great majority of Depp's alleged assaults had been proven to a civil standard^[7][33] and were found to be "substantially true".^[32] The verdict found that Depp had assaulted Heard in 12 of the 14 alleged incidents and put her in fear of her life.^[8][34]

After the verdict, Depp resigned from the Fantastic Beasts film series at the request of Warner Bros., its production company.^[35] In March 2021, the Court of Appeal rejected Depp's request to appeal the verdict, concluding that the appeal had "no real prospect of success".^[36] Lawyers for Depp had argued that he had not received a fair hearing and that Heard was an unreliable witness, but the appeals judges concluded he had a "full and fair" trial, and that "the judge based his conclusions on each of the incidents on his extremely detailed review of the evidence specific to each incident [...] in an approach of that kind there was little need or room for the judge to give weight to any general assessment of Ms. Heard's credibility."^[36][37] According to The New York Times, the use of material from the UK trial has been limited in the US case, but the specifics have not been disclosed publicly.^[34]

Heard's op-ed in The Washington Post

In December 2018, The Washington Post published an op-ed written by Heard and titled "Amber Heard: I spoke up against sexual violence—and faced our culture's wrath. That has to change."^[38][11][39] In the article, Heard stated: "Two years ago, I became a public figure representing domestic abuse, and I felt the full force of our culture's wrath for women who speak out. ... I had the rare vantage point of seeing, in real time, how institutions protect men accused of abuse."^[11][40] She further stated that, as a result of this, she had lost a film role and an advertising campaign for a global fashion brand.^[34] The op-ed called for Congress to re-authorize the Violence Against Women Act and did not explicitly mention Depp by name.^[41]

Adam Waldman's comments in the Daily Mail

Matters from Heard's counterclaims^[3] pursued through the trial related to three statements made by Depp's lawyer, Adam Waldman, and published by the Daily Mail in April and June 2020.

First, Waldman stated that "Amber Heard and her friends in the media used fake sexual violence allegations as both sword and shield, depending on their needs. They have selected some of her sexual violence hoax 'facts' as the sword, inflicting them on the public and Mr. Depp."^[16][17][42]

Waldman's second statement regarded a 2016 incident in Depp and Heard's Hollywood penthouse: "Quite simply this was an ambush, a hoax. They set Mr. Depp up by calling the cops but the first attempt didn't do the trick. The officers came to the penthouses, thoroughly searched and interviewed, and left after seeing no damage to face or property. So, Amber and her friends spilled a little wine and 'roughed the place up', got their stories straight under the direction of a lawyer and publicist, and then placed a second call to 911."^[16][17][43]

Third, Waldman stated: "We have reached the beginning of the end of Ms. Heard's abuse hoax against Johnny Depp."^[16][17][44]

Trial

In February 2019, Depp sued Heard over her December 2018 op-ed in The Washington Post.^[2][41][45] Depp claimed that Heard's allegations were part of an elaborate hoax against him and repeated his allegation that Heard had been the one who violently abused him.^[2][45] In August 2020, Heard countersued Depp, including the allegation that he had coordinated "a harassment campaign via Twitter and [orchestrated] online petitions in an effort to get her fired from Aquaman and L'Oréal."^[3][46] The trial was held at the Fairfax County Circuit Court. The location was chosen on the basis that the servers for The Washington Post's online edition are located in the county.^[2][47] However, it has also been speculated that Virginia was chosen due to weak Anti-SLAPP laws allowing success in defamation cases to be more achievable.^[48]

Pre-trial developments

In October 2020, the judge in the case disqualified Depp's lawyer Adam Waldman from representing Depp after he leaked confidential information covered by a protective order to the media.^[49] Following the verdict in Depp's lawsuit against The Sun the following month, Heard's lawyers filed to have the defamation suit dismissed, however, Judge Penney S. Azcarate ruled against this because Heard had been a witness in the UK case (as opposed to a defendant), the facts alleged were different (Heard's allegedly defamatory statements were made after the English case commenced), and the parties had not been subject to the same discovery procedures as in the United States.^[50] In August 2021, a New York judge ruled that the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) had to disclose documents related to Heard's charity pledge to the organization.^[51][52] The ACLU would later ask Depp for $86,000 as their charge for producing the documents.^[53]

The trial began with jury selection in Fairfax County, Virginia, on April 11, 2022.^[54] Actors Paul Bettany, James Franco, and Ellen Barkin were mentioned as being expected to testify.^[55] According to a source close to his legal team, Tesla and SpaceX CEO and Heard's now-ex-boyfriend Elon Musk was originally listed as a potential witness, however, he made the decision not to testify in the trial.^[56]

Opening statements

Opening statements were made on April 12, 2022. Lawyers representing Depp accused Heard of fabricating domestic abuse accusations about Depp to further her career, saying that Heard made the accusations because Depp had asked for a divorce.^[55] They argued that, while Heard's 2018 op-ed did not mention Depp, it was clear by implication that it referred to him, and that Heard's writing in that article ("two years ago, I became a public figure representing domestic abuse") was a reference to her May 2016 restraining order request, in which she claimed that Depp had physically abused her. Depp's lawyers discussed Heard appearing in public with a bruised face on May 27, 2016, accusing her of staging the injury, citing that Depp had not met her since May 21, 2016, and witnesses did not see her with the injury immediately after May 21, 2016.^[40]

Heard's lawyers claimed that Depp had physically and sexually abused Heard on multiple occasions during their relationship, usually triggered by his addiction to alcohol and drugs.^[40][55][57] They accused Depp of seeking to "humiliate Amber, haunt her, wreck her career" with the Virginia lawsuit and to turn the case into a "soap opera".^[55] They further argued that the First Amendment protected Heard's right to express her views in the op-ed, which was mostly focused on a broad discussion of domestic violence and did not explicitly mention Depp's name. Finally, Heard's lawyers stated that the allegations had not changed Depp's reputation, as they had become public knowledge two years prior to the op-ed, and that Depp had instead ruined his career in Hollywood himself with his drinking and drug use; this made him "unreliable" in the eyes of film studios.^[40][57]

Testimony

Witness testimony started at April 12, and ended at May 26.

Witnesses for Depp

Witnesses for Heard

Witnesses for Depp in rebuttal

Witnesses for Heard in rebuttal

Closing arguments

Depp's legal team

Depp's legal team maintained that Heard was the abuser in their relationship and that Heard's allegations against Depp were untrue and had ruined his life.^[62][63] They asked the jurors to "give him his life back".^[64] "You either believe all of it or none of it. Either Mr. Depp assaulted Ms. Heard with a bottle in Australia, or Ms. Heard got up on that stand, in front of all of you, and made up that horrific tale of abuse," lawyer Camille Vasquez told the jury. "An act of profound cruelty not just to Mr. Depp but to true survivors of domestic abuse."^[64] Vasquez told the court that Heard "came into this courtroom ready to give the performance of her lifetime ... and she gave it."^[63]

Vasquez also argued that Heard "burns bridges" and "her close friends don't show up for her", because, according to Vasquez, apart from Heard's sister, every other person who testified on behalf of Heard was a "paid expert", whereas, in contrast, many witnesses showed up to testify for Depp in court.^[65][66]

Heard's legal team

Heard's legal team maintained that Depp did abuse Heard, and that even if he did not abuse her, the op-ed was not libelous as it did not mention Depp by name nor directly address her allegations against him.^[62] They told jurors to "think about the message that Mr. Depp and his attorneys are sending to Amber and victims of domestic abuse." "If you didn't take pictures, it didn't happen," Benjamin Rottenborn, a lawyer for Heard, said. "If you didn't seek medical attention, you weren't injured." He claimed Depp "cannot and will not take responsibility. [...] It's all somebody else's fault." He told jurors that "if Amber was abused by Mr. Depp even one time, then she wins."^[63] Rottenborn accused Depp of "victim blaming at its most disgusting".^[67]

Verdict

On June 1, 2022, after nearly two days of deliberations,^[68] the jury found that Depp had proven all the elements of defamation for all three statements from Heard's 2018 op-ed, including that the statements were false, and that Heard defamed Depp with actual malice.^[16][17] The jury awarded Depp $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages from Heard.^[69][70] The punitive damages, however, were reduced to $350,000 due to a limit imposed by Virginia state law.^[18]

In regard to Heard's counterclaim, the jury found the second of the three contested statements that Depp's former lawyer Adam Waldman had published in the Daily Mail to be defamatory and false, defaming Heard with actual malice.^[17][70][71] Regarding the other two contested statements, the jurors concluded that Heard's attorneys had not proven all the elements of defamation.^[16][17][70] Heard was awarded $2 million in compensatory damages from Depp but no punitive damages.^[16][72]

Reactions

The trial drew much attention from supporters of both Depp and Heard as well as the general public. At the start of the trial, several legal experts suggested that Depp had a smaller chance of winning than he did in the previous UK trial, citing the strong free speech protections in the US.^[10][9]

Social media

In 2016, Newsweek conducted a review of tweets that used the actors' names and were liked at least 100 times, finding about 36 that backed Amber Heard or disparaged Johnny Depp, versus only two in support of Depp. Since April 19, 2022, a similar study found that at least 509 tweets had been posted and met the criteria of the 2016 study, with a vast majority giving support to Depp.^[73][74] Those posting about the trial on social media were seen to mostly support Depp^[75] and oppose Heard.^[76][77] Videos carrying the hashtag #justiceforjohnnydepp had attained over 18 billion views on TikTok by the trial's conclusion.^[78] BuzzFeed News reported that, between April 25 and 29, 2022, there were 1,667 posts uploaded to Facebook using the hashtag #JusticeForJohnnyDepp, with over 7 million total interactions, i.e., likes and shares between them. In comparison, Heard only had 16 posts in support, with 10,415 interactions. Additionally, on TikTok, videos tagged with #JusticeForAmberHeard had over 21 million combined views, while videos tagged with #JusticeForJohnnyDepp had over 5 billion combined views as of April 29.^[75] Two of Heard's expert witnesses, psychiatrists Dawn Hughes and David Spiegel, had their WebMD profiles targeted by negative comments following their appearances during the trial.^[79][80]

Data collected by Newswhip from April 4 to May 16, 2022, indicated that news articles about the trial had generated more social media interactions per article in the United States than all other significant news topics, including the leaked Supreme Court draft opinion on abortion and the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.^[81] Data from SimilarWeb showed that entertainment news websites such as People, Us Weekly, and the New York Post saw traffic increases of between 9 to 22% for the month of April 2022 compared to April 2021 as a result of the trial.^[81] Law&Crime, which broadcast the trial, had a 50-fold increase in daily viewership on their app compared to before the trial; the president of the Law&Crime network, Rachel Stockman, stated that the consumption of coverage of the Depp v. Heard trial was significantly higher than that of the trial of Derek Chauvin in June 2021.^[81]

The trial was livestreamed. Twitter, TikTok, and Instagram users expressed opinions about the case or rallied against others doing the same.^[75][82][77] Clips of the trial were used to create memes, compilation or reaction videos, with multiple such videos going viral.^[83] A compilation of Heard's lawyer's repeated objections to Depp's testimony had gathered 30 million views on TikTok and 15 million views on YouTube as of April 29, 2022.^[84] Other viral TikTok trends included videos of users acting out Heard's testimony, or making "aroused facial expressions" over her testimony of sexual abuse.^[85][86] Dan Evon from Snopes is among journalists with views such that the claim Heard stole movie lines, such as from the talented Mr Ripley, was implausible.^[87][88] Nur Ibrahim of Snoops is one of several journalists observing, in relation to short video clips used to claim that Heard used cocaine on the stand, that these videos provided no evidence for this and that extended clips showed otherwise.^[89][90]

In May 2022, the media non-profit The Citizens and Vice World News reported that the conservative website The Daily Wire had spent between $35,000 and $47,000 on Facebook and Instagram advertisements and have promoted "misleading information about the trial" and "anti-Amber Heard propaganda".^[91]

Journalist Amelia Tait of The Guardian said that Heard v Depp had turned into "trial by TikTok", stating that the case had become "a source of comedy" on social media.^[85] This was also noted by journalists at BuzzFeed News,^[75] The Independent,^[82][86] and Vanity Fair.^[92] Amanda Hess, a critic writing for The New York Times, opined that the broadcasting of the trial "is an invitation for the proceedings to be deliberately, even gleefully tailored to a viewer's whim", with Internet platforms like TikTok and YouTube being "practically built to manipulate raw visual materials in the service of a personality cult, harassment campaign or branding opportunity."^[93] Shannon Keating, a culture writer and editor for BuzzFeed News, wrote that the "social media frenzy around this case was clearly fueled by savvy PR", bots, and conservative media advertising, with the result that "lots of people have happily accepted the propaganda as sacrosanct."^[94]

Bill Goodykoontz of The Arizona Republic criticized the coverage of the trial on social media, stating that "Depp and Heard are real people with real problems, after all, not just meme fodder and hashtag subjects," and that "the vile nature of some of the misogynistic tweets and TikTok videos posted about Heard were toxic masculinity at its worst."^[95] Katherine Denkinson of The Independent compared the backlash on social media against Heard and her supporters during the trial with Gamergate, claiming that "the anti-Amber train has been expertly commandeered by the alt-right."^[96] Sunny Hundal of The Independent, commenting about positive online content about Depp and negative online content about Heard, opined that even as Depp "continued to entertain people during the trial", "being an entertainer doesn't automatically mean you're a good person. And yet many simply cannot get their head around this idea."^[86] Law professor Mary Anne Franks claimed that she encountered out-of-context, distorted depictions of the trial despite trying to avoid reading about it.^[97]

Court spectators

As only 100 spectators could be selected each day, a color-coded wristband system was implemented.^[98] Crowds outside of the courthouse would cheer at Depp on his arrival while heckling and booing Heard. On the fourth day of the trial, two Depp supporters were removed from the courtroom when it was discovered that they had made death threats towards Heard online.^[99]

In the final week of the trial, a woman was removed from the courtroom after she stood up and yelled to Depp: "This baby is yours!" and claimed to be his soulmate.^[100] A court spectator had previously removed himself after being unable to control his laughter during the trial.^[101]

In an effort to comfort and amuse Depp, alpacas were brought to the court house.^[98] Depp had previously commented that he would not work on another Pirates of the Caribbean film even if Disney offered him $300 million and one million alpacas.^[102]

To the verdict

Depp's reaction

Depp commented on his experience, saying, "six years later, the jury gave me my life back. I am truly humbled."^[103][104] Depp also stated that he was "overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and the colossal support and kindness from around the world". He continued: "I hope that my quest to have the truth be told will have helped others, men or women, who have found themselves in my situation, and that those supporting them never give up."^[105] Depp also highlighted "the noble work of the Judge, the jurors, the court staff and the Sheriffs who have sacrificed their own time to get to this point", and praised his "diligent and unwavering legal team" for "an extraordinary job".^[106]

His full statement, posted on Instagram, has become one of the most-liked Instagram posts of all time with over 19 million likes.^[107][108]

Heard's reaction

Within minutes of the verdict, Heard released a statement that she was "heartbroken that the mountain of evidence still was not enough to stand up to the disproportionate power, influence and sway of my ex-husband".^[109][110] She described the verdict as a "setback" for women, elaborating that it "sets back the clock to a time when a woman who spoke up and spoke out could be publicly shamed and humiliated", "sets back the idea that violence against women should be taken seriously", and also expressed sadness that "I seemed to have lost a right I thought I had as an American – to speak freely and openly."^[110]

After the trial, a spokeswoman for Heard announced her plans to appeal the decision.^[111][112] Heard's lawyer, Elaine Bredehoft, said that Heard could not pay the damages she owed to Depp and had "excellent grounds" for an appeal.^[113][114]

Heard's first interview since the verdict was done with NBC.^[115] In the interview, Heard said she stood by her testimony, declaring: "I spoke truth to power and paid the price." She said that she received "hate and vitriol", criticized social media for not providing "a fair representation", and stated, "this is the most humiliating and horrible thing I've ever been through."^{[115][116][117]} Heard said that she did not "blame" the jury for the verdict because Depp was a "fantastic actor" and "people feel they know him".^[115] When asked about a previously issued statement saying that she still had love for Depp, Heard replied, "Absolutely. I love him." When the interviewer posited that the jury did not believe her testimony and evidence, Heard asked, "how could they after listening to three-and-a-half weeks of testimony about how I was a non-credible person [...]?"^[115][118]

Other reactions

On June 2, 2022, The Washington Post affixed an editor's note to Heard's 2018 op-ed to notify readers of the defamation suit and its outcome, reading, "On June 1, 2022, [...] a jury found Heard liable on three counts. [...] The jury separately found that Depp, through his lawyer Adam Waldman, defamed Heard in one of three counts in her countersuit."^[119]

Various columnists, legal experts, and observers on social media reacted strongly to the verdict. Legal experts considered the verdict unusual; defamation suits by public figures are rarely successful in the United States, relevant case law being New York Times Co. v. Sullivan and the subsequent Curtis Publishing Co. v. Butts.^{[120][121][122][123]} New York Times reporter Jeremy W. Peters said that, in publishing allegations of abuse, "both [...] women and the press assume the considerable risk that comes with antagonizing the rich, powerful and litigious."^[124] Psychology professor Jennifer Freyd, who coined the term Darvo (deny, attack, and reverse victim and offender), stated that "there has been a lot of Darvo" in this case, with "an overwhelming case for Depp on social media".^[9] Dan Novack of The Atlantic argued that the verdict concluded a "fair trial" and was not a markedly different interpretation of the First Amendment, which he says remains "enormously protective of media reporting on credible accusations of sexual abuse. It is telling that Depp did not name the ACLU&nbsp [...] or The Washington Post."^[125]

Columnists, including feminist writers and researchers in intimate partner violence, considered the verdict a backlash against feminism and the #MeToo movement and predicted a chilling effect on the speech of those victims of domestic violence who might fear being sued for defamation or disregarded without extensive photographic and medical evidence.^[126] Others argued that the verdict was in fact an expansion of #MeToo to male victims of intimate partner violence and a "victory in the battle against cancel culture".^[127] Some were skeptical of the trial's long-term effect, arguing that the trial's context was too unusual to be indicative of #MeToo's reversal.^[128] Leading sexual assault lawyer Debra Katz described the trial as having unique celebrity, "dysfunction", and "craziness" but judged that the Depp v. Heard verdict was less "consequential" to #MeToo compared to Harvey Weinstein losing his appeal for his rape conviction the next day.^[97] Tarana Burke, generally considered the founder of #MeToo, tweeted that "The 'me too' movement isn't dead, this system is dead [...]. When you get the verdict you want, 'the movement works' – when you don't, it's dead [...] This movement is very much alive."^[128] Jack Houghton, digital editor of Sky News Australia, wrote that Vasquez's cross-examination showed the public that Heard was not credible and further stated that the ruling that Waldman defamed Heard was "hardly a verdict that a cabal of sexist jurors would render".^[129]

An April survey conducted by Morning Consult found that about 68% of US adults had "very" or "somewhat" favorable views of Depp, a number which had dropped to 56% after the trial. The drop was most pronounced among baby boomers, with a decrease from 59% to 37%, and least among Generation Z respondents, decreasing from 72% to 70%.^[130]

Notes

References

External links

• Op-ed written by Amber Heard for The Washington Post
• Trial exhibits at the Fairfax County website
• YouTube playlists (with varying content) via: Law&Crime Network link and Sky News link