Amber Heard testifies, saying she was physically and sexually abused on multiple occasions before and during her brief marriage to Johnny Depp. Photo / Steve Helber, Pool, AP
Amber Heard testifies, saying she was physically and sexually abused on multiple occasions before and during her brief marriage to Johnny Depp. Photo / Steve Helber, Pool, AP
Johnny Depp was hallucinating and his sobriety had completely collapsed in the final months of his marriage, his ex-wife has testified in the civil lawsuit between the two.
Heard was back on the stand as the trial resumed in a Virginia courtroom after a one-week hiatus.
Heard also revised earlier testimony about the timing of the first time she says she was physically assaulted by Depp. And she strongly denied an accusation from Depp that she left human faecal matter in the couple's bed after a fight.
Actor Johnny Depp arrives into the courtroom at the Fairfax County Circuit Courthouse. Photo / Steve Helber, Pool, AP
Heard said it was the couple's Yorkshire terrier that messed the bed and that it had a history of bowel problems ever since it had accidentally ingested Depp's marijuana.
"Absolutely not," she said about the alleged poop prank. "I don't think that's funny. I don't know what a grown woman does. I was not in a pranking mood."
The poop allegation is one of several that Depp's online fans have particularly latched onto in their social media critiques of Heard.
Depp is suing Heard in Fairfax County Circuit Court for libel over an op-ed she wrote in The Washington Post describing herself as "a public figure representing domestic abuse". His lawyers say he was defamed by the 2018 article even though it never mentioned his name.
Monday was Heard's third day on the witness stand in the trial, which is now beginning its fifth week. Her testimony focused primarily on the final months of the couple's marriage, which lasted from 2015 to 2016.
"He was talking to people who weren't in the room. It was terrifying," she said. "It was unclear to me whether he was even mad at me or he was convinced that the guy he said he saw me with was in the room."
Actors Amber Heard and Johnny Depp watch as the jury leave the courtroom for a lunch break at the Fairfax County Circuit Courthouse. Photo / Steve Helber, Pool, AP
Jurors saw a video of Depp slamming cabinets in a kitchen and pouring himself an oversized glass of wine with Heard trying to ascertain why Depp was mad.
At the beginning of her testimony, she corrected herself about the timing of the first time she said Depp slapped her, which revolved around her questioning him about one of his tattoos. Heard initially said that happened in 2013, but she said that it actually happened in 2012. She said her confusion resulted from the fact that she wanted to believe in her mind that the abuse hadn't begun so early in their relationship.
"I had kind of allowed myself to forget that the beginning was violent and chaotic as well," she said.
Heard has told jurors she was physically and sexually abused on multiple occasions before and during her brief marriage to Depp. Depp has already testified and denied he ever hit Heard.
The details of their relationship are relevant to the lawsuit because one of her defences is that she was indeed abused by Depp.
