Johnny Depp and Amber Heard’s Combat Left House Broken, Witness Says

The property supervisor at an Australian house the place Johnny Depp and Amber Heard stayed in 2015 throughout their tempestuous marriage testified on Monday in regards to the injury he surveyed after considered one of their most fractious clashes.

The supervisor, Ben King, described touring the place after the struggle and discovering a scene of damaged glass, blood drippings, a broken bar high and a collapsed Ping-Pong desk.

It was the aftermath of an episode that’s emblematic of the dueling accusations which have crammed the defamation case filed by Mr. Depp in opposition to Ms. Heard. Mr. Depp has mentioned that in that struggle Ms. Heard hurled a vodka bottle at him that shattered and severed his fingertip. She has countered that he severed it himself when he smashed a cellphone in opposition to a wall.

Mr. King testified that he discovered Mr. Depp’s fingertip in a “scrunched up” piece of paper amid the wreckage.

The property supervisor’s testimony got here after Mr. Depp completed a fourth and closing day on the stand in Fairfax County Circuit Courtroom in Virginia. Throughout his testimony, Mr. Depp has described how his relationship with Ms. Heard dissolved, typically utilizing florid descriptions or pantomiming blows he mentioned she had aimed toward him and suggesting he had been “damaged” by the expertise.

“That’s psychologically, emotionally the place I used to be,” he testified on Monday whereas being questioned by considered one of his attorneys. “I used to be on the finish.”

In court docket papers, Ms. Heard has accused Mr. Depp of repeatedly abusing her all through their relationship, alleging that he slapped her, kicked her, head-butted her and tore clumps of hair out of her scalp. In 2018, she wrote an opinion piece in The Washington Put up, describing how her profession had been negatively affected by changing into a “public determine representing home abuse.”

The piece didn’t identify Mr. Depp, however he has argued that it clearly was alluding to him and harmed his profession and repute.

Mr. Depp beforehand sued The Solar newspaper in England for printing a headline that referred to as him a “spouse beater.” He misplaced that case in 2020.

Mr. Depp and Ms. Heard met when Ms. Heard was solid as Mr. Depp’s love curiosity within the 2011 movie “The Rum Diary.” They had been married in 2015 and divorced in 2017.

Testifying on Monday, Mr. Depp mentioned he discovered in a broadcast interview with a Disney govt, dated two days after Ms. Heard’s opinion piece got here out, that he wouldn’t be returning to the “Pirates of the Caribbean” franchise for a possible sixth movie. Mr. Depp testified that he mentioned he had needed the characters within the movies — together with his character, Captain Jack Sparrow — to have a “correct goodbye.”

Mr. Depp gave the impression to be referring to a 2018 Hollywood Reporter interview with Sean Bailey, a Disney govt, during which the reporter requested, “Can Pirates survive with out Johnny Depp?” Mr. Bailey responded that he needed to herald “a brand new vitality and vitality” to a doable “Pirates” reboot.

“All of the sudden I used to be responsible till confirmed harmless,” Mr. Depp mentioned.

Throughout cross-examination of Mr. Depp on Monday, Ms. Heard’s attorneys argued that the actor’s repute had been in decline effectively earlier than the 2018 article, citing a 2017 Hollywood Reporter article calling him a “star in disaster” and one other describing the “diminishing returns of Johnny Depp.”

“It’s a stack of hit items generated by Ms. Heard’s publicity staff,” Mr. Depp responded.

Mr. Depp has testified that he by no means hit Ms. Heard — nor any lady — and that she was the aggressor within the relationship, insulting him utilizing demeaning language that escalated into bodily violence. Ms. Heard has denied hitting Mr. Depp besides in self-defense or in protection of her sister.

There could be little doubt that the environment between the 2 was typically incendiary.

Mr. Depp was confronted throughout cross-examination with textual content messages to others during which he referred to Ms. Heard utilizing vulgar insults; in response to a very graphic and violent textual content message about Ms. Heard, Mr. Depp mentioned on Monday, “It’s irreverent and summary humor.”

In his testimony, Mr. King mentioned that he had labored at a residence belonging to Mr. Depp in London and likewise on the home in Australia, the place Mr. Depp stayed whereas engaged on one of many “Pirates” movies.

He testified that he had seen and heard many arguments between Mr. Depp and Ms. Heard. These tended to comply with a sample, Mr. King added, during which Mr. Depp would go away a room and Ms. Heard would comply with. Mr. King mentioned one dispute in London started when Ms. Heard requested Mr. Depp why he had taken his hand away from her, including that he thought she had gave the impression of a “spoiled teenage little one.”

Mr. King testified that he was referred to as to the home after Mr. Depp’s finger had been severed, and he recalled Ms. Heard was sobbing as he entered. The premises had been in disarray, he mentioned. A bit had been damaged out of a marble staircase. Blood had stained the carpet and streaked a number of partitions.

In a decrease stage of the house, Mr. King mentioned, there was a scent of alcohol and cans strewn close to a bar. He started wanting in that space and mentioned he quickly discovered the fingertip, “nested” in a blood-streaked piece of paper. Mr. King then positioned it right into a plastic bag in order that it might be rushed to a hospital, he added.

Mr. Depp’s finger was later surgically repaired.