In Virginia, Johnny Depp's second defamation trial begins.
In Virginia, Johnny Depp's second defamation trial begins.
After losing in a UK court in 2020, Johnny Depp will have another chance to defend himself against charges that he assaulted ex-wife Amber Heard in a Virginia trial that begins today.
Depp sued Heard in 2019 over an op-ed she wrote for the Washington Post in which she alluded to previous charges against Depp and said she had become "a public figure symbolising domestic abuse," according to Depp.
She did not name Depp or go into any detail about the abuse in the op-ed, instead focused on the backlash she has faced since revealing the allegations in 2016, as well as the work that remains for the #MeToo movement. Depp's attorneys accused her of creating an elaborate deception in order to ruin his career, and filed a $50 million claim as a result of those six words. She responded by filing a $100 million counterclaim in response to the allegation that she had devised a fraud.
Jurors in Fairfax, Virginia, roughly 20 miles west of Washington, D.C., will hear witness evidence, examine messages and images over the next six weeks before deciding who is telling the truth. Opening comments could be heard on Tuesday, as jury selection begins today.
The trial will be carried live on Court TV, causing a media frenzy outside the Fairfax County Courthouse, where fans will be lined up early in the morning to grab one of the few seats in Courtroom 5J. Judge Penney Azcarate has already made it illegal for onlookers to sleep out on the courthouse grounds overnight.
The trial could be Depp's final chance to save his career. He disputes Heard's accusations, claiming that it was she who abused him.
He sued The Sun tabloid in the United Kingdom in June 2018 over an article that called him a "wife beater." In that instance, the Sun won because Judge Andrew Nicol ruled that the newspaper's portrayal was "substantially true." Depp and Heard both testified for many days during the trial, which included 14 separate incidences of alleged abuse.
In November 2020, the judge noted, "I accept her evidence of the nature of the assaults he conducted against her." "They have to be terrifying." Mr. Depp, I accept, put her in fear of her life."
The court said he believed Heard's story of a trip to Australia in March 2015, when she said he assaulted her and grabbed her by the neck, leaving her with cuts on her arms, while filming the last "Pirates of the Caribbean" instalment. According to the trial testimony, Depp allegedly cut his finger and scrawled words in his blood.
In another incident in December 2015, the judge determined that Depp had head-butted Heard and seized chunks of her hair. The judge also gave credence to a claim that Depp shoved Heard against a wall and grabbed her by the throat while they were on a train in Southeast Asia.
Depp was yanked from the third chapter of the "Fantastic Beasts" franchise just days after the verdict. The "Pirates of the Caribbean" series has already dropped him.
In light of the U.K. ruling, Heard's attorneys attempted to have the lawsuit dismissed in Virginia. Azcarate, on the other hand, rejected the motion, citing the enormous differences in libel rules between the United States and the United Kingdom and reasoning that allowing a U.S. court to recognise a British libel decision would set a "hazardous precedent."
Heard's lawyers, on the other hand, will be able to use Virginia's anti-SLAPP law to stop frivolous litigation on topics of public significance. The statute does not apply, according to Depp's lawyers, because Heard's charges are about Depp's personal behaviour rather than a larger issue.
