Johnny Depp may lose defamation case even if Amber Heard flops on the stand, legal experts say

Actress Amber Read’s “performance” on the stand past week — that is what Johnny Depp’s lawful crew has known as it — has been broadly panned. But that may not be plenty of to give her ex-spouse Depp a victory in his defamation circumstance versus her, specialists informed Fox News Digital.

Trial guide and system language qualified Susan Constantine analyzed Heard’s turn in the witness box and gave her a thumbs down for believability. 

“She is not truthful and most of what she’s expressing is a lie,” Constantine mentioned in her estimation.

“This is these poor performing, I never know how she’s heading to get a film purpose following this.”

“This is this kind of lousy acting, I you should not know how she’s heading to get a movie purpose just after this,” reported demo expert and physique language expert Susan Constantine

Depp, 58, is suing Heard, 36, for $50 million about a 2018 op-ed she wrote in the Washington Put up determining herself as “a community determine representing domestic abuse.” 

Despite the fact that the piece did not reference Depp by title, he statements it ruined his profession and turned him into a Hollywood pariah.  

JOHNNY DEPP V. AMBER Read DEFAMATION Trial: Live UPDATES

Listened to is countersuing for $100 million, accusing Depp and his previous law firm of conspiring to defame her by calling her abuse allegations a “hoax.”

Read put in two days on the stand very last week chronicling Depp’s alleged functions of verbal, bodily and sexual abuse that she claims left her with a damaged nose, black eyes and bruises.

In agonizing depth, Read described how Depp allegedly raped her with a bottle of Maker’s Mark in a drug-fueled rage on a excursion to Australia in March 2015.  

But lots of critics have termed out her tearless sobbing and melodramatic tone as inauthentic.

Heard’s facial expressions and physique movements are incongruent and so exaggerated as to be “off the scales,” Constantine reported. She added that the “Aquaman” star recounts far too lots of extraneous facts that trauma victims typically wouldn’t bear in mind — especially 6 or more decades after the point. 

JOHNNY DEPP V. AMBER Read: THE Shocking TRIAL’S WILDEST Moments

“Liars give you too considerably facts,” she reported. 

But that does not mean that every thing Read has stated is not real, Constantine observed. 

“I consider that when she explained the headbutt, she was currently being truthful,” she claimed, referring to Heard’s allegation that Depp launched his head into her and choked her unconscious for the duration of an 2015 argument at their penthouse.

“I do assume he was verbally degrading at moments,” she additional.

First Modification lawyer George Freeman, director of the Media Law Resource Center, said that Depp has a steep hill to climb to win the scenario. The “Black Mass” actor has to prove not only that Heard’s statements are false but that she knew they had been untrue when she manufactured them, Freeman claimed. 

“When a general public figure sues, it’s much a lot more hard to win,” explained Very first Modification law firm George Freeman

He also has to convince the jury that her accusations truly weakened his popularity.

“When a general public figure sues, it can be a great deal additional tricky to win,” Freeman described. “He has to verify what was going on inside her head, that she realized she was lying.” 

A personal human being only has to demonstrate negligence or carelessness to prevail in a defamation circumstance.

Heard’s attorney, Ben Rottenborn, has argued that Depp also has to confirm that Read was basically referring to him in the op-ed. If he does, the jury only has to locate that Depp verbally abused Heard the moment for him to eliminate his defamation case, the lawyer has mentioned.

But civil and matrimonial lawyer Marilyn Chinitz disagreed, countering that the op-ed plainly referenced Depp and a domestic violence claim Read publicly created in opposition to him two many years prior.

The “London Fields” star, with bruises on her facial area and paparazzi in tow, went to a Los Angeles courthouse to acquire a restraining buy towards Depp in Could 2016, accusing him of bashing her in the eye with a cellphone. 

“It is a very clear line of declaring that Depp abused her physically even if she didn’t use his identify,” she reported. 

Chinitz extra that the scenario will appear down to the cross-evaluation of Heard and no matter if Depp’s lawful crew can undermine her to the place that the jury will not credit score any component of her testimony. 

The demo in Fairfax County Circuit Court in Virginia went dark this 7 days for a pre-scheduled crack but will resume Monday with Read again on the witness stand. After her testimony wraps, her lawyers approach to connect with Depp back again to the stand as perfectly as his ex-girlfriend, Ellen Barkin, and Amber’s sister, Whitney Read, but not automatically in that order, in accordance to a resource shut to her staff.

Equally sides have accused every single other of physical and verbal abuse and offered witnesses, audio recordings and images that have bolstered their respective claims. 

Depp, who has named Read the abuser in their connection, testified that she hurled a vodka bottle at him, severing the tip of his finger through an notorious Australia blowup in 2015.

“I assume they’ve each ruined themselves in this lawsuit,” reported Chinitz, who represented Tom Cruise and Michael Douglas in their respective divorces. “You don’t get a favorable sensation about either of them.”

Heard’s countersuit, alleging that Depp defamed her by calling her abuse assert a hoax, suffers from equivalent obstacles, claimed felony and civil legal professional Mark Bederow.

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Heard’s group will have to demonstrate that Depp, not his lawyer, was basically driving the disparaging comment.

“But even if a person celebration prevails, it will be a pyrrhic victory,” Bederow told Fox Information Digital. “Both equally of their reputations have been severely broken on the community stage.”