Amber Heard demands new trial months after $10m defamation verdict, claiming original case excluded therapy notes
5 December 2022, 08:00
Amber Heard is seeking a fresh defamation trial against her ex-husband Johnny Depp.
The actress has filed court documents which say she is seeking the verdict in the defamation case to be reversed, or wants an entirely new trial.
Heard, 36, filed the appeal last month which argued that the exclusion of her therapy notes, in which she reported being abused by Depp, resulted in an unfair trial.
The notes were ruled out by Virginia Judge Penney Azcarate.
In June, Johnny Depp was awarded $10.35m after his legal team argued that Heard’s Washington Post op-ed in which she accused him of domestic abuse, was defamatory.
“The trial court improperly prevented the jury from considering several separate instances in which Heard reported Depp’s abuse to a medical professional,” Heard’s lawyers wrote.
“If not reversed, the trial court’s exclusion of contemporaneous reports of domestic abuse to medical professionals will make it more difficult for other abuse victims to prove allegations of abuse, and likely deter them from coming forward.”
Heard was awarded $2m on one count of her counter-suit against Depp.
Heard’s legal team also say the trial should have taken place in California, instead of Fairfax, Virginia.
Virginia, where the Washington Post houses its servers, was an “entirely inconvenient forum with no connection to Depp or any meaningful connection to his claims,” the filing reads.
Depp’s legal team has also filed an appeal to the result of the case, saying that the counter suit of Depp was “erroneous.”
“The jury’s emphatic favorable verdict on all three defamatory statements alleged in his complaint fully vindicated Mr. Depp and restored his reputation.”
