Matthew Barakat, Associated Press Published Thursday, April 28, 2022, 3:36 PM EDT Last Updated on Thursday, April 28, 2022, 5:51 PM EDT
Falls Church, Virginia (AP) – Amber Heard insisted on including details of her marriage to fellow actor Johnny Depp in an article she wrote about domestic violence, although her lawyers wanted those passages removed from the article, which is now the subject. a defamation lawsuit, according to evidence presented Thursday during the trial.
Jurors in the defamation lawsuit filed by Depp v. Hurd heard testimony Thursday from Terence Doherty, chief adviser to the American Civil Liberties Union. It was the ACLU that produced the article under Hurd’s name, reflecting her role as the ACLU’s ambassador for gender-based violence.
Doherty testifies to the push and pull that occurred between the first draft and the publication of the article in The Washington Post in December 2018 – strategically scheduled by both the ACLU and Hurd to coincide with the release of Aquaman. she played an important role.
Depp filed a lawsuit in Fairfax County Court after the article published, in which Hurd said, “Two years ago, I became a public figure in domestic violence and felt the full force of our culture’s anger at women who speak openly.” Depp’s lawyers say this is a clear reference to the allegations she made against Depp in 2016, which Depp said was untrue.
Doherty testified that many ACLU attorneys reviewed the article at various stages and asked Hurd’s attorneys to review the article to make sure it was not inconsistent with a non-disclosure agreement she had with Depp over the divorce. of the couple in 2016
During those discussions, Hurd sent back an edited version approved by her attorneys that “specifically castrated much of the copy of her marriage,” according to an email from Jessica Weitz, an ACLU official who coordinated with Hurd.
However, according to the email, Hurd was looking for a way to recover a deleted passage in the article.
The various drafts of the articles were not shown to the jury, so it is not clear how much personal data was in the first draft and how much Hurd’s lawyers cut.
But the final version contains very little about Hurd’s personal experience. Depp is not mentioned at all. In addition to the passage on “public figure representing domestic violence”, in another passage she writes: “I had the rare view to see in real time how institutions protect men accused of violence.”
Much of the article discusses legislative priorities for advocates of domestic violence prevention. Other passages refer to parts of her personal life that are not related to Depp.
Doherty testified that “the language in the last article is very different from the original language” in the draft, Doherty said. “This is not directly related to Ms. Hurd’s relationship with Johnny Depp.”
While the process must end whether Depp was defamatory in the article, very little evidence in the first three weeks leading up to Thursday is related to the article itself or its content. Hurd’s lawyers predicted at the beginning of the trial that it would become a soap opera that would delve into confusing details of Depp and Hurd’s personal lives.
However, Hurd’s lawyers said that even if the jury believed that she had never been abused by Depp, Hurd should still prevail because the article is not about Depp, he does not slander him and Hurd’s rights to freedom of speech allow to assess issues of public importance such as domestic violence.
Much of Doherty’s testimony also focuses on whether Hurd has kept her promise to donate $ 3.5 million – half of her $ 7 million divorce agreement with Depp – to the ACLU. Doherty testified that the ACLU has lent her $ 1.3 million so far and expects the money to come over a 10-year period, but she has not made contributions since 2018.
The jurors also heard briefly from Depp’s business manager, Ed White. White said he intervened in 2016 to resolve Depp’s financial difficulties, including unpaid taxes and money laundering. When he accused Hurd of an excessive wine bill that included multiple $ 500 bottles of Spanish Vega Sicilia wine, Hurd’s lawyers answered a number of questions about Depp’s excess spending, including spending millions of dollars to ash Hunter S. Thompson’s ashes. cannon.
Depp and Hurd met during the filming of The Rum Diary, an adaptation of Thompson’s novel. Depp testified earlier that he and Thompson were friends, and that Depp actually found the lost manuscript of the Rum Diary while reviewing Thompson’s documents.
Add Comment