Last-minute video and close questioning of adverse witnesses: Johnny Depp’s lawyers played their last cards on Friday in an attempt to discredit the accusations of his ex-wife Amber Heard, at the actor’s lawsuit against a British tabloid which he had described as an abusive husband.
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After three weeks of hearing in the High Court in London, the libel case is nearing its end.
Each of the 14 incidents cited by the Sun in its defense is hotly contested by the hero of “Pirates of the Caribbean”. Johnny Depp, 57, claims to have never raised a hand on a woman and in return accuses his ex-wife Amber Heard, whom he describes as a narcissistic and sociopathic calculator.
On Friday, Johnny Depp’s lawyers sought to demonstrate that the 34-year-old actress could be violent.
They thus introduced into the debates video extracts from the shooting of a reality show dating from 2006-2007. Received the day before from an anonymous source, these images show the sister of the 34-year-old American, Whitney Henriquez, being questioned around a swimming pool by other participants about marks on her face and upper chest, which do not appear prominently in low quality images.
“I can’t believe Amber kicked your ass,” one of the participants is heard saying to Ms. Henriquez. “Did you fight? », She continues, inspecting the body of the young woman, adding:« She really kicked your buttocks ». Faced with pressing questions, Whitney Henriquez retorts that she does not want to talk about it.
“First, it was really a bad reality show,” said the sister of the actress, after watching these clips.
The young woman then explained that she was referring to a “verbal argument”, not “physical”. Under the fire of questions from Eleanor Laws, lawyer Johnny Depp, she repeated that the other participants had no other goal than to try to spice up a conversation of total flatness, to “create a story”, by “looking for wounds that weren’t there”.
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Fear of “retaliation”
“We do not see any mark,” she stressed, repeating that her sister had indeed been the victim of “domestic violence”.
In video conference from Los Angeles, Rachel Pennington, “best friend” of Amber Heard when she was with Johnny Depp, testified in this direction. She nevertheless admitted to never having seen the actor to be violent with the American actress.
Quickly, Johnny Depp’s lawyer tightened the noose around the young woman. “You made all of this, didn’t you?” You lied and lied again for your friend, ”she told him. Categorical answer: “absolutely not”.
Rachel Pennington claimed to have seen Amber Heard in December 2015 with torn hair, damaged lip and scalp injuries. Mr. Depp’s lawyer then accused her of taking photos to “catalog things” that “did not happen”, which the witness categorically denied.
Question after question, Eleanor Laws accused the young woman of having participated in the lies she accuses Amber Heard who, in these proceedings, has the status of witness cited by the Sun.
The very last witness in this trial described as a “blockbuster” in the British press, iO Tillet Wright, a friend of Amber Heard. On May 21, 2016, he was on the phone with Amber Heard during an argument with Johnny Depp and ended up calling the police.
While his friend was accused of being motivated by financial motivations, he had taken up her defense by writing an article published on the internet at her request. “No one wanted to do it publicly, because they were afraid of reprisals from Mr. Depp,” he said. At the time, many feared being “blacklisted” in Hollywood if they took up the cause for Amber Heard, he said, explaining that after the publication of the article, his agent had been “threatened”.
The trial continues Monday and Tuesday with the pleadings of the lawyers.
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