Amber Heard lied about donating $7m to charity, says Johnny Depp
Amber Heard, the actress, has donated just US$550,000 (NZ$768,000) of her US$7 million divorce settlement to charity, a court has heard.
Johnny Depp, Heard’s exhusband, began his appeal yesterday against last year’s High Court judgment that he assaulted his exwife and that a 2018 article in The Sun calling Depp a ‘‘wife beater’’ was ‘‘substantially true’’.
The actor is seeking a retrial of his libel claim against the newspaper, saying ‘‘fresh evidence’’ has emerged allegedly showing that Heard told a ‘‘calculated and manipulative lie’’ when she claimed she donated the US$7 million settlement to charity.
After the 2016 divorce, Heard said she would split the sevenfigure sum between the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and the American Civil Liberties
Union (ACLU), an organisation which helps victims of domestic abuse.
Lawyers for Depp told the Court of Appeal they had evidence to suggest that the ACLU and LA children’s hospital had only received US$450,000 and US$100,000 respectively. ‘‘This fresh evidence goes to the heart of the matter,’’ they argued. ‘‘It demonstrates that Ms Heard was a dishonest witness.’’
Andrew Caldecott QC, for
Depp, asked the court to permit a retrial of ‘‘this exceptional case’’, adding: ‘‘Ms Heard’s evidence was accepted too glibly, without proper examination.’’
The court heard that a further US$500,000 donation was made to ACLU anonymously, but it is unclear whether this came from Heard personally.
Adam Wolanski QC, representing News Group Newspapers, publishers of The Sun, said in written submissions that ‘‘the evidence is not ’fresh’ at all’’ and only shows that Heard ‘‘has not yet finished making her pledged payments to the charities’’.
‘‘The evidence would have had no impact on Ms Heard’s credibility had it been before the trial judge, since it does not demonstrate that Ms Heard or any of the respondents’ witnesses lied,’’ he added. Lord Justice Underhill and Lord Justice Dingemans reserved judgment to a later date.