Amber Heard explains photos of herself with scars on the red carpet after Johnny Depp vodka bottle fight
A Virginia court has been shown photos of Amber Heard’s scarred arm at a 2015 red carpet event which she said was caused by a violent incident involving Johnny Depp and a vodka bottle.
“Those are scars that I obtained as Johnny was strangling and assulting me on a countertop in Australia,” Ms Heard told the court on Monday as she took the stand during the former spouses’ multi-million-dollar defamation trial.
Jurors were shown a photo taken at a New York City premiere for the independent movie When I live my life over again on 15 April 2015.
Ms Heard said the event took place soon after an incident in early March in Australia where she said “Johnny held me down on the counter tops and my arms were cut on the glass in that attack”.
Another photo from a second red carpet event was shown to the court, revealing several scars on Ms Heard’s left arm as she brushes her hair from her face.
Ms Heard said that she had tried to cover the scars with makeup but they were “a bit harder to cover as they’re rather fresh”.
Ms Heard returned to the stand for a third day of testimony as the trial resumed after a one-week break on Monday.
Mr Depp is suing his ex-wife for defamation over a 2018 op-ed she penned for The Washington Post where she described herself as a “a public figure representing domestic abuse”.
The Pirates of the Caribbean actor is not named in the article, which is titled “I spoke up against sexual violence – and faced our culture’s wrath. That has to change”.
However Mr Depp claims that it falsely implies that he is a domestic abuser – something that he strongly denies – and that it has left him struggling to land roles in Hollywood. He is suing for $50m.
Ms Heard is countersuing for $100m, accusing Mr Depp of orchestrating a “smear campaign” against her and describing his lawsuit as a continuation of “abuse and harassment”.
The trial began on 11 April in Fairfax, Virginia, with explosive testimony playing out inside the courtroom.
