Amber Heard says she’s not to blame for stories about her split from Johnny Depp being leaked to celebrity gossip website TMZ.
Heard wrapped up her fourth day of testimony in Depp’s libel suit against her. During cross-examination Tuesday in Fairfax, Virginia, the “Aquaman” actress was asked how TMZ and a “sea” of paparazzi knew the location and time when she filed a temporary restraining order against Depp in 2016.
“Ms. Heard, you testified yesterday that when you left the courthouse after obtaining the domestic violence restraining order against Mr. Depp, you walked out to a sea of paparazzi and cameras. Right?” Depp’s attorney Camille Vasquez asked. “That’s correct,” Heard responded.
“You knew the media was going to be there, didn’t you?” Vasquez continued.
“No I did not,” Heard told the court. “I assumed since it’s a public building, there was that possibility. But I was shocked.”
Vasquez noted that Heard brought a publicist along to the courthouse, suggesting that she was prepared for the media onslaught.
The attorney then played a videotaped deposition Heard gave on Aug. 13, 2016. In the video, Heard was asked about the restraining order and a text message she sent to Depp’s security guard, Jerry Judge.
Heard said on the tape that she reached out to Judge because she wanted to warn him that TMZ had learned she would be filing a restraining order and was planning to divorce Depp. Heard said she wanted Judge to warn Depp because she didn’t want the “Pirates of the Caribbean” actor to learn about the restraining order “from some other source, other than TMZ which was alerted,” Heard testified before cutting herself off and covering her mouth with her hands.
“You slipped up there. Didn’t you ,Ms. Heard?” Vasquez asked Tuesday after the tape ended. “You let it slip out that TMZ had been alerted to your filing of the domestic violence restraining order. Didn’t you?”
“I disagree. That’s not what I was talking about,” Heard said. Vasquez then mentioned other leaks, including one in which TMZ obtained an exclusive video of Depp attacking kitchen cabinets.
“TMZ owns the copyright now, doesn’t it? Did they pay you for that?” Vasquez asked. An indignant Heard responded, “I never got paid because I had nothing to do with that.”
Also Tuesday, Heard’s former best friend, Raquel Pennington, testified via pre-recorded video deposition about a fight between the couple. Pennington lived in one of Depp’s Los Angeles penthouses with her partner, but said she hadn’t spoken to Heard in more than a year because the two grew apart.
Pennington was asked about a trip to a trailer park in which Depp and Heard reportedly fought. Pennington said Depp became “angry and aggressive” toward Pennington’s friend when she hugged Heard, prompting Depp to tell her to “get off my woman.”
A pre-recorded video deposition from Heard’s friend IO Tillet Wright was also played for the court. Wright, a former photographer for the New York Times, said Depp was open about his drug addiction. “Mr. Depp expressed to me that he wanted to get sober for Amber. That he didn’t enjoy being sober.” Wright said Depp resented having to be sober and felt it was “distressing and exhausting.”
Wright said when Depp would drink and/or take drugs he would get “very mean, surly, paranoid, very paranoid.” Wright testified that the “Pirates” star would become demeaning and “weave elaborate stories in which Amber was having affairs with every man that she ever worked with and every woman she ever came in contact with.”
Wright added that both Depp and Heard shared details about their feelings and problems in the relationship. Wright said Depp would make jokes about everyone in his life including about Heard’s “appearance, her talent, her lack of talent as he perceived it,” and that he thought Heard was only famous “because of her looks.”
Depp is suing Heard for $50 million claiming she libeled him in the 2018 op-ed piece in The Washington Post. Heard filed a $100 million counterclaim for defamation for Depp’s attorney calling her a “liar.”