Johnny Depp has appealed against the decision in defamation case that awarded Amber Heard $2 million in damages, calling it “erroneous” decision.
The ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ actor ultimately won over $10 million in damages after winning all three of his defamation claims, and his ex-wife won one of her three countersuit claims, during their six-week trial earlier this year over an op-ed the ‘Aquaman’ star wrote in 2018 about being a victim of domestic violence.
But on Wednesday (02.11.22), Johnny’s legal team made a filing in the Virginia Court of Appeals, arguing the 59-year-old star should not be held liable for comments made by his attorney, Adam Waldman, who had told the Daily Mail in comments published on April 26, 2020, that Amber and her friends had set-up his client by calling police with a “hoax” of abuse claims in 2016, remarks the jury decided he had made while acting as an agent for the ‘Black Mass’ actor.
Despite an “emphatic favorable verdict” for their client, Johnny’s attorneys claimed in court papers that “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.”
They continued: “The judgment in Ms. Heard’s favor on that lone statement is erroneous. Ms. Heard’s claim was fatally flawed, and the trial court should have granted Mr. Depp’s motion for summary judgment and his motion to strike the evidence.
Amber has also lodged an appeal over the verdict, having previously failed in a bid to have a mistrial declared amid claims of jury fraud.
