Johnny Depp has filed to appeal Amber Heard‘s counterclaim win during their highly publicized court battle. Calling the verdict “erroneous,” the actor’s lawyers are pushing for the decision to be overturned. After six weeks in May, Depp-Herd’s much publicized defamation trial had come to an end in favour of the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ star.
He had been awarded $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages. The latter was reduced to Virginia’s statutory cap of $350,000. Amber Heard too had a small win, as the judges awarded her $2 million in favour of a defamation countersuit. Now, Depp has appealed against Heard’s lone win.
Johnny Depp Appeals Against Amber Heard’s Win
Amber Heard had accused that Johnny Depp, through his lawyer, Adam Waldman, defamed her by calling her accusations a ‘hoax’. The court observed that the statements made by Waldman were defamatory indeed. Depp and his team had promised that they will appeal against the judgement in Heard’s favour.
Now, Depp has submitted a 44-page appellate brief. As mentioned in court documents published online by Law & Crime Network, the brief read, “the trial court was confronted with a number of novel and complex legal and factual issues, and although the trial court decided the vast majority of those issues sensibly and correctly, a few rulings were erroneous.”
The court document also added, “As a matter of law, Mr. Waldman is an independent contractor, whose allegedly tortious conduct is not automatically attributable to Mr. Depp.” Depp sent the notice just a day after Heard filed an appeal to nullify the verdict ordering her to pay $10 million.
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The Never Ending Back And Forth Trial Of Depp And Heard
Johnny Depp had sued Amber Heard for defaming him in a 2018 Washington Post article, where she called herself a survivor of domestic abuse. Though Depp’s name was not mentioned, he claimed that the op ed directly implied that he was the abuser, and resulted in his career and reputation being destroyed.
The tumultuous relationship of Heard and Depp was made into a film. Titled ‘Hot Take: The Depp/Heard Trial’, the film streamed exclusively on the free Tubi streaming service from September 30. The film stars Mark Hapka as Johnny Depp and Megan Davis as Amber Heard. Melissa Marty will join Hapka and Davis as Depps lawyer Camille Vasquez and Mary Carrig will portray as Heards lawyer, Elaine Bredehoft.
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