Johnny Depp – Pirate Now Vicious Wife Beater Confirmed by British Court !

In May 2016, Amber
Heard, a 30-year-old actress, arrived at a Los Angeles court
seeking a restraining order against her husband, the Hollywood star
Johnny Depp.

As she left the building, she found herself surrounded by
photographers, journalists and film crews. On her cheek was what
appeared to be a mark. The court was also shown photographs of what
looked like facial bruising.

She said Depp had “violently” attacked her and in a rage had
thrown a mobile phone at her face with “extreme force”. There were
also allegations of other incidents of domestic violence. She said
she had endured “excessive emotional, verbal and physical abuse”
and “angry, hostile, humiliating and threatening assaults”. Depp
denied the abuse.

The restraining order was granted, and soon after the
marriage was over.

Four years later the couple were back in court, but this time in
London. However, this was not Amber Heard’s case – she had not
chosen to be here. This was a libel action Depp had brought against
a British newspaper, The Sun.

At the heart of the case was his assertion that the allegations
of physical abuse were an “elaborate hoax”. Depp employed one of
the best-known libel barristers in the country to try to prove the
claims were untrue.

Over the next three weeks, Heard arrived at court each day and
walked past her former husband’s fans, who were convinced that it
was their hero who was the victim and it was she who had assaulted
him. In court her story, photos, memories and the accounts of her
friends were all exposed to the world and said by Depp’s team and
supporters to be part of a plot to falsely prove that he was, as
The Sun had claimed in April 2018, a “wife beater”.

It was not just the fans and media who were watching carefully.
Lawyers were already wondering, if he won, what impact this would
have on women coming forward with claims of domestic violence.

Outside, Johnny Depp would arrive each day to cheers. But his
behaviour and lifestyle were also under the microscope – and a
judge has now ruled that The Sun’s allegations were
“substantially true”.

“Would you like a Johnny Depp face mask?”

A woman holding a cardboard box offered me a small brown
envelope. Inside was a black-and-white bandana and personal note of
thanks from Johnny Depp. The woman, who was part of the actor’s
entourage, disappeared into court as all around me fans and
onlookers began to inspect their new scarves.

This was a strange court case.

The rest of Britain was in lockdown, buses and streets in
central London were deserted, and yet here, outside the Royal
Courts of Justice, there was a crowd, sometimes more than 200
strong. Some wore masks but when Johnny Depp arrived, all attempts
at social distancing collapsed in the crush to catch a glimpse.

Inside the High Court, it was even more peculiar.

The Royal Courts of Justice are huge, gothic and deeply solemn.
It’s a place of stone arches and hushed tones. And in July it was
almost empty. I say almost, because there were a few people – a
handful of journalists hurrying through security, and also
lingering in the hallways and passages a scattering of Depp
fans.

One woman showed me her arms, which were covered in tattoos of
Johnny Depp. Another man arrived each day dressed as Jack Sparrow,
the star’s character in Pirates of the Caribbean.

And then at around 10:00 each day they would gather at the door
to Court 13. As Depp walked past they would offer messages of
support and, towards the end of the case, he was seen giving them
all a hug. A little chant of “Johnny, Johnny” could be heard as he
walked into court.

The accusations were shocking. Heard said she had been
assaulted by him on more than 14 occasions. She said she had, at
times, been in fear for her life and left with a broken nose, black
eyes and split lip. Vicious, drunken tirades had, she said, lasted
for days. There was also a 15th allegation too traumatic and
personal to be heard in open court.

It felt like a criminal trial; Depp was being accused of
repeated assaults on his former partner, the sort of violence that
has sent others to prison. But this wasn’t a criminal trial.

It was easy to forget this was a libel battle between Depp
and News Group Newspapers, the publishers of The Sun, because
no-one from the newspaper was called to the witness stand. Dan
Wootton, the journalist whose article had said there was
“overwhelming evidence” that the actor was a “wife beater” was not
even on the list of 79 names cited in the trial’s documents.

And what a list of names it was. The case began with an email
exchange about the perils of addiction between Depp and Sir Elton
John and then continued with references to a bewildering cast of
characters. James Franco, Marilyn Manson, Elon
Musk, Winona Ryder, Kate Moss and Vanessa Paradis were all
guest stars in a story that took a private world of the Hollywood
A-list and blew it apart.

We were shown text messages and video footage of meetings in
lifts. The super-rich spend millions protecting their privacy and
here was a couple revealing a telephone directory’s worth of
secrets. No star would do this unless they felt there was something
bigger at stake. For Depp, that was restoring his reputation.

But why did this battle begin in the UK?

The article with the Dan Wootton byline, in particular the
phrase “wife beater” in a headline that was later changed, had
given Johnny Depp a chance to test his ex-wife’s claims in court –
and what’s more, an English court.

It would require a much longer article to explain all the
differences, but the essence of the legal split between England and
America is that if you write something defamatory in London, the
burden is on you to prove it is true.

In America, the defamed person has to prove it isn’t true, a
very different task. It sounds a slender legal nicety but it can
make all the difference.

England and Wales’s libel law was tightened in 2013, but it is
still one of the best places in the world for the rich (and it is a
rich person’s game) to take on the media. If you want to win a
libel case and you have a choice about where to bring it, lawyers
will suggest buying a ticket to Heathrow.

And if you want to understand how big an issue this was for
Depp’s reputation, look at what he was trading. He lived in a world
of security guards and private planes. Going to court blew it
apart.

If you ever wondered what it was like to be Depp, this case
lifted the lid on his privileged but erratic existence, his temper
and his history with drink and drugs.

Amber Heard was 22 when she met Johnny Depp on the set
of the film The Rum Diary in 2009. He was 23 years older
and in a long-term relationship with singer and actress Vanessa
Paradis. Heard’s wife at the time was the artist Tasya Van Ree.

Two years later, Heard was living with Depp in a penthouse in
downtown LA, Depp having separated from Paradis, his partner
of 14 years. Heard and Depp married in February 2015, and just
over a year later it was over.

Since then, Amber Heard has become a vocal campaigner on the
issue of domestic and sexual abuse. The UN Human Rights Campaign
named her as a Human Rights Champion for her work promoting women’s
rights. She became an Ambassador for Women’s Rights for the
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and she has given speeches
and written in the Washington Post and New York Times about her
experience of domestic violence.

In the era of Me Too, she was a leading figure, speaking up for
women who had suffered in silence by revealing the abuse she had
endured at the hands of one of the most powerful people in
Hollywood. She was Amber Heard, actor, model, activist and domestic
abuse survivor.

When Johnny Depp described her accusations as a hoax, he was not
just challenging her story, he was ripping away the foundations of
her public profile. There was a lot at stake here.

The entire process, which involved an almost brutal public
examination of a couple’s private life, has been a warning to
anyone who wants to use the courts to restore a reputation.

It was clearly a deeply troubled relationship, but the case
depended on proving who had done what to whom.

And in the end, the judge decided it was true to describe Depp
as a “wife beater”.