(NOTE CONTENT) In a Virginia courtroom today, attorneys for Amber Heard were unsuccessful in their motion to lobby Judge Penny Azcarate to dismiss the $50 million defamation lawsuit leveled against the actress by her ex-husband Johnny Depp.
As reported, Depp is alleging a 2018 op-ed in The Washington Post that obliquely accused the actor of physical and sexual abuse, was not only false, but it devastated his reputation and career.
Attorneys for both parties took turns in oral arguments to the judge without the jury present, with Depp’s attorneys mounting a longer, point-by-point defense of why the case should proceed, including a recap of the testimony detailing how the ACLU helped Heard craft her controversial op-ed, and the abuse the Pirates of the Caribbean star allegedly suffered at the hands of the Aquaman actress.
“She even lied about the final insult left on the marital bed,” one of Depp’s attorneys added, regarding the testimony about the poop Depp’s camp says Heard left in their bedroom.
In the end, Judge Azcarate ruled for the plaintiff, Depp, noting, “if there is a scintilla of evidence that a reasonable juror could weigh, then the matter survives a motion to strike.”
She added, there is, “evidence that jurors could weigh that the [op-ed] statements were about the plaintiff, that the statements were published and that the statement was false,” and “that the defendant made the statement knowing it to be false or…made it so recklessly as to amount to willful disregard for the truth…”
The judge then declared the case will resume following a lunch break.
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