Depp ‘scrawled graffiti with his severed finger’

Raging star ‘destroyed house’, trial told

JOHNNY DEPP used a severed finger dipped in paint to scrawl graffiti on a mirror and walls following an explosive row with ex-wife Amber Heard, the High Court has been told.

The Hollywood actor has been accused of assaulting Ms Heard, 34, and “completely destroying” a house in Australia in a drink and drug-fuelled rage.

The allegations were put to Mr Depp on his third day on the witness stand in his libel action against The Sun newspaper.

Mr Depp said he “vehemently denied” subjecting Ms Heard to a “three-day ordeal of assaults” during the Australia trip, saying it was “pedestrian fiction”.

The 57-year-old is suing the tabloid’s publisher News Group Newspapers (NGN) and its executive editor Dan Wootton over an April 2018 article which labelled him a “wife beater”.

Mr Depp’s lawyers say the article made “defamatory allegations of the utmost seriousness”, accusing him of committing serious assaults on Ms Heard and “inflicting such serious injuries that she feared for her life”.

The incident in Australia is one of 14 alleged incidents of violence, all denied by Mr Depp, relied on by NGN in their defence against the actor’s libel claim.

Sasha Wass QC, lead counsel for NGN, said Ms Heard alleges there was a “three-day ordeal of assaults, during which you were

under the influence of drugs including MDMA and you were violent”.

Mr Depp said: “I vehemently deny it and would go so far as to say it is pedestrian fiction.”

Actor Johnny Depp giving evidence against The Sun newspaper at the High Court.

The barrister put it to Mr Depp, that he was “drinking regularly” and “taking controlled drugs” at the time, to which he said: “I respectfully disagree with your assumptions.”

Mr Depp told the court that Ms Heard threw a vodka bottle at him, severing his finger, and that after this he began “what I feel was probably some species of a breakdown”.

Ms Wass said that on the last day the couple were in Australia, Ms Heard “came downstairs in the morning... and the house was completely destroyed”.

She said: “Everything was broken and shattered, the television, the window, there was paint everywhere and it was clear at that stage that you had very seriously damaged your finger.”

Ms Wass also said: “You had written on a mirror. You had written in paint but you had used your finger, your injured finger, in place of a paintbrush so you had dipped your injured finger in the paint and then used your finger to do the graffiti.”

Mr Depp said: “At first, I had used my blood.”

In a witness statement before the court, Mr Depp said he had written on a mirror and walls “in blood and paint”.

The actor’s case against NGN and Mr Wootton arises from an article on The Sun’s website on April 27, 2018, which had the headline, “Gone Potty: How can JK Rowling be ‘genuinely happy’ casting wife beater Johnny Depp in the new Fantastic Beasts film?”.

I vehemently deny it and would go so far to say it is pedestrian fiction.