The Times - UK (2020-07-21)

the times | Tuesday July 21 2020 2GM 5

News

Johnny Depp’s former wife accused the
actor yesterday of repeatedly threaten-
ing to kill her, disfigure her face if she
abandoned him and have her raped if
she wore revealing clothes. Amber
Heard told the High Court in London
that their relationship was scarred by
his drug-taking, violence and jealousy.
Depp, 57, is suing Dan Wootton, the
executive editor of The Sun, and the
newspaper’s publisher over an article in
2018 that described him as a “wife beat-
er”. As Depp watched, Heard, 34, told
the court: “The physical abuse and the
worst of the verbal abuse would usually
happen when he was drunk or high on
drugs, which was often. Much of the
time he had difficulty recalling what he
had done once he had slept it off.”
Heard, a star of the Aquaman super-
hero film, claimed that Depp openly
started taking cocaine after Keith Rich-
ards, the Rolling Stones guitarist,
visited his private Bahamas island in

2013. “It soon became clear that it was
      turning into a habit, which, combined
      with drinking and use of other drugs,
      many of them on prescription, became
      a problem,” she said.
      The Sun relies on 14 alleged incidents
      of domestic violence, all denied by
      Depp. “The physical abuse included
      punching, slapping, kicking, head-
      butting and choking me, as well as
      throwing me into things, pulling me by
      my hair and shoving me or pushing me
      to the ground,” Heard said. “He threw
      things at me, especially glass bottles.”
      Heard said the abuse contributed to
      her suffering “a severe decline” in her
      mental and physical health. “I was
      afraid he was going to kill me, either
      intentionally or just by losing control
      and going too far,” she said. “He explic-
      itly threatened to kill me many times.”
      Depp told her that “death was the
      only way out of the relationship” and if
      she left he would respond by “carving
      my face up so no one else would want
      me”, she said, adding that his “control-
      ling and intimidating behaviour” in-
      creased during their relationship.
      “When I became involved with John-
      ny everything of mine suddenly be-
      came not good enough,” she said: “My
      clothes weren’t right. My doctor wasn’t
      right. I would be offered alternatives
      supplied by Johnny.” Heard said she
      stopped wearing revealing dresses for
      red carpet events because of the “verbal
      and psychological abuse”. “He started
      saying things like, ‘Well, I’m going to
      have to watch you get raped’,” she said.

Heard added: “He has a unique ability

to use his charisma to convey a certain

impression of reality. He is very good at

manipulating people. With me, he was

able to express contrition after acts of

violence.

“He would blame his actions on a

self-created third party, which he often

called ‘the monster’. He would speak

about it as if it was another person or

personality.” She claimed that Depp

surrounded himself with doctors, law-

yers and executives who failed to give

him “honest feedback”.

“Johnny lives in a state of weaponised

victimhood,” she said. “To hear him talk

about his childhood or past relation-

ships, he is always the victim. He func-

tions off zero accountability.” She said

she could not confront him about his

alcohol and drug abuse as “he would get

angry and call me ‘the moral police’ ”.

The court was played part of a re-

corded conversation in which Heard

admitted “clocking” Depp in the jaw,

pelting him with pots and pans and tell-

ing him: “You are such a baby. Grow the

f*** up.”

Heard told the court she threw ob-

jects “only to escape” Depp. “I did have

outbursts of anger and there were times

when, yes, I lost my cool,” she said.

She admitted taking the drug

MDMA and magic mushrooms after

attending the Coachella festival on her

30th birthday without Depp but denied

being addicted to “cocaine and liquor”.

Heard also denied lying to try to

cover up her British assistant’s illegal

work in the US. She said she invited

Savannah McMillan to the US as “a

friend” who “ran errands”.

Heard later signed a letter to US

Homeland Security saying Ms McMil-

lan was not working for her in the US.

Kate James, Heard’s former personal

assistant, said last week that the actor

asked her to help to draft a letter that

falsely claimed that Ms McMillan was

just a friend, which meant she would

not fall foul of visa regulations. “I knew

this to be untrue, and that Amber was

therefore wilfully lying,” said Ms James,

who was sacked by Heard in 2015.

Depp has told the court he was never

violent towards Heard, that she

attacked him, and has accused his ex-

wife of “building a dossier” of false

allegations as an “insurance policy”.

The trial continues.

Fathers4Justice use case

to start divorce campaign

Charlie Parker

Fathers4Justice seized on the Depp

case to launch a new campaign for

divorce reform.

The group, known for stunts includ-

ing scaling Buckingham Palace, parked

a van outside the Royal Courts of

Justice in central London, bear-

ing the words “Ditch The

Witch” over an image of

the actor and Amber

Heard.

Their relationship

was “the greatest ad-

vert for divorce”, the

group said, adding

that the process in

Britain was unfair to

men. It claimed that the

Divorce, Dissolution and

Separation Bill, which

would add a “no fault” reason

for divorce, would make it easier to re-

move fathers from families. The bill is

expected to become law next year.

Matt O’Connor, the group’s founder,

said the Divorce4Men campaign would

highlight divorces such as that of Jeff

Bezos, the Amazon owner, “to stop

people getting married”. “It’s a man

trap,” he said. “The divorce laws

are a gold-diggers’ charter.

They don’t encourage

women to be financially

independent following

divorce. It’s a licence to

bill, giving greedy

bridezillas a lifetime’s

maintenance.”

The campaign seeks

an end to spousal

maintenance and a legal

presumption of 50/

shared parenting and div-

ision of assets.

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‘Death only way out, Depp told me’

Like dating a king:

the secret romance

S

oon after

Amber Heard

began a

relationship

with Johnny

Depp, she discovered

that a secret romance

with him was like

“dating a king” (David

Brown writes). After

meeting on the set of

The Rum Diary in

2009, a comedy-drama

based on the novel by

Hunter S Thompson,

Heard said the actor

had begun pursuing

her. She was in a

relationship with the

artist Tasya van Ree

and Depp was with the

actress Vanessa

Paradis.

“I thought he was

charismatic and

interesting,” she told

the High Court

yesterday. “We would

hang out sometimes

with the director, just

drinking wine and

talking. We had a lot

of things in common,

like blues music, I love

blues. After that shoot,

I didn’t hear from him

directly, although he

would send me gifts.

One time he tried to

have a guitar delivered

to my house.”

Heard said she next

saw Depp two years

later. Depp’s publicist

invited her to meet the

actor and the British

director Bruce

Robinson in a hotel

room. “When I turned

up, this time it was

just Johnny,” she said.

“By this time I had

broken up with Tasya.

Johnny told me that

his relationship with

Vanessa Paradis was

also over, but it wasn’t

public yet. Our

romantic relationship

then began.”

Depp invited her to

spend a weekend at

the Trump SoHo hotel

in New York in late

2011. “I booked a room
      and met him there,”
      she said. “I remember
      I had to go out to run
      an errand, and when I
      came back, my bags
      were in his room. He
      said he had them
      moved and I would
      stay with him now. At
      the time, I thought it
      was kind of romantic.”
      She said Depp
      wanted to keep their
      relationship secret as
      his separation from
      Paradis was not public.
      “When we were
      together it was always
      just the two of us. We
      would be at his
      compound, behind
      gates. It was like I was
      dating a king, with his
      level of fame and the
      way he lived.
      “I learnt then that I
      had to suspend all
      expectations of
      normalcy, but I later
      came to understand
      how this protected
      him, isolated me and
      facilitated
      unacceptable
      behaviour.”

David Brown
Amber Heard and
Johnny Depp faced
each other across the
High Court yesterday

JULIA QUENZLER VIA REUTERS

Leonardo

DiCaprio, far

left, and

Channing

Tatum

Leonardo DiCaprio was “Pumpkin-
head”, Channing Tatum was “potato-
head” and the actor Jim Sturgess was
simply “Jim Turd Sturgess”.
Amber Heard told the High Court
yesterday that Johnny Depp, who
believed that his wife had affairs with
male and female co-stars, including
Kevin Costner, Eddie Redmayne and
Kelli Garner, would make up nick-
names for her alleged
lovers.
Depp was alleged to
have believed that Heard
began sleeping with Elon
Musk, the Tesla and
SpaceX billionaire, soon
after their marriage,
and had an affair
with her former
“wife” Tasya
van Ree, the
court has been
told. Heard

The Pumpkin and Potatohead claims

said Depp was “very jealous” and she

would have to justify to him her role in

any movie, particularly if it involved

kissing or a sex scene.

“He would insist every male actor

was trying to sleep with me and/or that

I had had an affair with them,” she said.

“He accused me of having affairs with

each of my co-stars, movie after movie:

Eddie Redmayne, James Franco, Jim

Sturgess, Kevin Costner, Liam Hems-

worth, Billy Bob Thornton, Channing

Tatum; even women co-

stars like Garner.

“He also accused me of

having affairs with stars I

auditioned with, like

Leonardo DiCaprio.”

Heard said she would

always tell Depp of any

scene that was “even questionably

romantic”.

“He’d accuse me of having this affair

on screen with this sexy person who

was younger than him,” she added. “He

would also call directors I was working

with on set or after he saw the film cut

to complain about nudity or how I was

portrayed.”

Heard claimed that Depp would try

to control what she wore as he “consid-

ers himself as an old-fashioned guy”.

“He demeaned me any time I tried to

wear anything that could be seen as

sexy, calling me a ‘whore’, ‘slut’, ‘fame-

hungry’ and ‘an attention whore’, but it

got worse over time,” she added.

She said Depp had accused her of

having wanted to “get f***ed on set; get

f***ed with f***ing James f***ing

Franco”.

She said that Depp had used his se-

vered finger dipped in paint to write the

name of Billy Bob Thornton, Heard’s

co-star in London Fields, on a mirror

during a rampage in Australia in 2015.

David Brown