A few weeks ago some pretty shocking phone calls were leaked, private conversations in which Amber Heard admitted to committing acts of domestic violence against Johnny Depp — and later taunting him about his inability to tell the world because no one would believe a petite woman like her was hurting him so much.
As evidence goes in the ongoing he said/she said battle between the exes, it was all very damning for Amber.
However, as much as many fans of the Edward Scissorhands star have made it known they want them to, the phone transcripts weren’t perfectly exculpatory for Johnny either.
Photos: Nastiest Celebrity Divorces
It sounded to us like he admitted to getting violent in response, which is also not OK at all.
Well now more phone evidence has become public — text messages which may poke holes in Johnny’s version of events, or at the very least provide a window into his state of mind at the time.
The texts come as a result of Johnny’s lawsuit against UK newspaper The Sun and executive editor Dan Wootton over an April 2018 op-ed with the headline:
“GONE POTTY: How can JK Rowling be ‘genuinely happy’ casting wife-beater Johnny Depp in the new Fantastic Beasts film?”
Depp is suing for libel, saying the tabloid was telling its readers he was “guilty, on overwhelming evidence, of serious domestic violence against his then wife, causing significant injury and leading to her fearing for her life, for which the claimant was constrained to pay no less than £5 million to compensate her, and which resulted in him being subjected to a continuing court restraining order; and for that reason is not fit to work in the film industry.” Johnny has always vehemently denied Amber’s accusations of abuse (and is also suing her for her own op-ed in the Washington Post).
Johnny even showed up to court on Wednesday only to find the lawyers for the defense had a secret weapon — 70,000 text messages which were “accidentally” disclosed to them by Depp’s former attorneys, the ones he fired.
Damn. Do not make enemies of your lawyers, y’all.
The defense’s legal strategy seems to be to prove what they wrote wasn’t libel because it was true; they showed the court a few of those messages in which, in their estimate, Johnny made reference to violence toward his then girlfriend.
According to DailyMail.com, the earliest message presented was from March 2013 when Johnny texted Amber and referenced an incident they believe is the same one in which she previously said they had a fight over a painting — and that he assaulted her.
In the message, Johnny describes it as a “horrendous moment” and more colorfully as a “disco bloodbath.” But he never specifically refers to what happened in any detail.
Then there were a couple messages to friend Paul Bettany, with whom Johnny co-starred in the universally panned comedy Mortdecai.
Warning: Disturbing Content Ahead
In November 2013, Johnny allegedly wrote:
“Let’s burn Amber”
and then:
“Let’s drown her before we burn her!!! I will f**k her burnt corpse afterwards to make sure she is dead.”
Whoa.
Disturbing AF, though we have to note we have no idea in what context these messages were sent. It seems a stretch to say these reflect an actual incident, but they do show a sick state of mind. Regardless, legally speaking, we’re not sure they prove what The Sun is going for here.
Anyway, that wasn’t the only message. In another one to Bettany, in May of 2014, they claim Depp wrote:
“I’m gonna properly stop the booze thing darling … Drank all night before I picked Amber up to fly to LA, this past Sunday… Ugly, mate… No food for days… Powders… Half a bottle of whiskey, a thousand red bull and vodkas, pills, two bottles of champers on plane and what do you get…??? An angry, aggro Injun in a f**kin’ blackout, screaming obscenities and insulting any f**k who got near… I’m done… I am admittedly too f**ked in the head to spray my rage at the one I love… for little reason, as well I’m too old to be that guy. But, pills are fine!!!”
The defense argues the flight Johnny is describing is the same one which Amber spoke about in her own legal filings last year.
Amber said Johnny was jealous of James Franco while she was shooting the film The Adderall Diaries, and got deranged and violent with her on the plane:
“On the flight, Johnny ordered the flight attendants to give him an oxygen tank, and drank heavily. Johnny’s handlers told me that he was upset that I was filming a movie with a romantic scene with James Franco the day before. Soon, Johnny began to throw objects at me. Instead of reacting to his behavior, I simply moved seats. That didn’t stop him. He provocatively pushed a chair at me as I walked by, yelled at me, and taunted me by yelling out the name ‘James Franco’… At some point, I stood up, and Johnny kicked me in the back, causing me to fall over. Johnny threw his boot at me while I was on the ground. Johnny continued to scream obscenities until he went into the plane bathroom and passed out locked in the bathroom for the remainder of the flight.”
The description here definitely sound like he’s admitting to being drunk as hell but not to what Amber alleges — and not necessarily to abuse at all. In fact he says he wasn’t directing his rage “at the one I love.”
But the defense tried to use his words to show he was lying about his version of those same events. As barrister Adam Wolanski QC said:
“His version of events is that he was quietly sketching during the flight.”
The defense added one more set of text messages, not from Johnny himself but from his nurse during a “detox trip” in the Bahamas in 2014. She said Johnny had gotten “manic” and was “full on – flipping out”; she described him as “angry with everyone but mostly himself.”
That sounds like detox alright…
Wait, messages from a nurse? Are we sure this doesn’t violate patient privilege?
Johnny’s own lawyer, David Sherborne, responded by saying
“Nowhere, I repeat, nowhere, is there a single smoking gun, text or email, no document – unlike Ms Heard’s own taped confession we looked at before – there is no document where Mr Depp says ‘I hit Ms Heard’ let alone ‘I hit her on numerous occasions.’”
Sherborne attested his client “simply never did it so they are not going to find it.” He continued:
“The idea that somehow these texts contradict the account (given by Mr Depp) and are therefore so critical to the defendants’ case just simply isn’t made out.”
We don’t want to take sides here, but based on what we’ve read here we have to agree. If these are the most damning messages they found in a stockpile of 70k texts, The Sun might have a hard time proving their case.
What do YOU think of these texts? Do they color how YOU see Johnny Depp and the case??
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