Law&Crime Sidebar - Depp v. Heard Day 21 Recap

Episode Date: May 25, 2022

Law&Crime's Jesse Weber breaks down Day 21 of the Johnny Depp v Amber Heard defamation trial. A Warner Bros. executive says an issue between Heard and actor Jason Momoa created a problem for the Aquaman franchise. Experts rip apart the testimony of key Heard witnesses. The owner of a trailer-park says Heard appeared to be emotionally abusive towards Depp. Then the cryptic email that suggests Heard's sister, Whitney, may not be telling the truth.SUPPORT THE SHOW:Get Surfshark VPN at https://surfshark.deals/LAW83 - enter promo code LAW83 for 83% off and 3 extra months for free!READ FULL TRIAL RECAPS:lawandcrime.comCHECK OUT OUR FRIENDS AT REDHANDED PODCAST: APPLE: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/redhanded/id1250599915SPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/0emVYc04B4y5UzBIvA0axoSUBSCRIBE TO OUR OTHER PODCASTS:Court JunkieThey Walk Among AmericaCoptales and CocktailsSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand. View Shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller

that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Mr. Knight, you are a pretty big fan of Johnny Depp, aren't you? I am not. To be honest, throughout the evening, I Sorry, I just asked you one question. I didn't ask you the rest of that. You wanted to participate in this trial, didn't you? I did not.

I was asked by the attorney, and I wanted to, they asked me, and I said, I'll be happy to come and tell the truth. That's Morgan Knight, a key witness called by Johnny Depp's side to cast some doubt on one of the worst allegations asserted by actress Amber Hurd. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. This is where we'll recap the biggest moments in the day's biggest trials. I'm Jesse Weber. So we're talking the ongoing trial of Johnny Depp versus Amber Heard out in Fairfax County, Virginia, which just wrapped up Day 21. Now, Depp is suing his ex-wife for $50 million claiming defamation,

namely that she falsely accused him of domestic violence in a 2018 Washington Post op-ed piece, and that that article ruined his life and his career. Now, Heard is actually countersuing Depp for $100 million, saying that he, through his attorney, Adam Waldman, orchestrated a public smear campaign in the media calling her accusations a hoax. Now, the day started off with a win for Amber Heard. The judge denied Depp's motion to strike or basically throw out her counterclaims, and now the judge is allowing those counterclaims to move forward to a jury. And from there, Hurd rested her case.

but then it was time for Depp's rebuttal case. Basically, this is Depp's chance to respond to all of Heard's witnesses. And what a response it was. It started with Dr. David Culber, a plastic surgeon who treated Depp's hand after the infamous 2015 Australia incident where Depp claims that Amber threw a vodka bottle at him severing his finger. Herd's team has suggested that while Depp was wearing this cast, he was pretty aggressive and pretty violent.

but Culber not only described the difficulty that someone would have to be that active with wearing a cast like that, but he never observed any damages to the cast if, in fact, Depp had hit someone or something. But I do want to talk about something else here, something that took up a majority of the morning, because Heard has been attempting to prove that as a result of Adam Walman's alleged defamatory statements, which she says was in coordination and at the direction of Johnny Depp, she lost millions of dollars, she lost career opportunities, and in fact, her team presented evidence to imply that not only did she almost lose her role of Mira in Aquaman 2, but her role was

significantly cut, all due to the Waldman Depp Smear campaign. That's her allegation. Well, Depp called Warner Brothers executive Walter Hamada. He's the president of DC Films, and he said neither Depp nor Waldman ever came up as a reason for any issues with Aquaman 2. Rather, it was something else. What if any creative concerns did Warner Brothers have about casting Amber Hurd as Mira and Aquaman 2? It was the concerns that were brought up at the wrap of the first movie, production,

the first movie, which is the issue of chemistry, did the two-up chemistry? You know, I think editorially they were able to make that relationship work. in the first movie, but there was a concern that it took a lot of effort to get there, and would we be better off, recasting, finding someone who had better, more natural chemistry with Piazza Mamoa, and move forward that way? Did Warner Brothers take any steps affirmatively to audition other actresses for the role of Mira in Aquaman, too? No, we did not. podcast is sponsored by Surf Shark VPN.

You know, when you're online and you're shopping, watching videos, reading articles, the last thing you want to be thinking about is that your personal information is being data mined by companies and people that you're being watched and surveilled. It's so intrusive. It's so problematic. It's a little creepy. Well, Surf Shark VPN can get rid of all these problems for you with an easy-to-use, one-for-all solution.

What they do is they basically turn you into an online ghost. an anonymous user. It makes it incredibly hard for someone to trace you online. And the best part about it is, with just the click of one button, you can forget about data mining. You can forget about intrusive advertisements. You can go back to just enjoying being online. And right now, they're offering a very special promotion. If you use promo code law 83, capital L-A-W-83, you can get 83% off plus three extra months for free. Now, I know a lot of you out of you out of there saying, I still don't know what Jesse's talking about. I don't even know what a VPN is, but I don't want to know one tracking me.

I'm kind of intrigued. Well, if that's the case, Surf Shark offers a 30-day money-back guarantee, so there's really no risk for you to try it. You can surf with your own set of rules. The link is in the description. So let's be clear here. According to Hamada, the guy at the top, not only did her not lose Aquaman 2, not only was she still paid for it, but any issues with her casting or recasting?

were due to chemistry problems with Jason Momoa. Hamada indicated it wasn't because of Waldman or Depp in any way. Now, why is this important? It's important because in defamation, in order to prove monetary damages, you have to show harm. What did you suffer? And Heard had called an entertainment industry expert, Catherine Arnold, who testified that Herd lost out on $45 to $50 million in opportunities

after being accused of faking her injuries. Well, Depp didn't take that lying down. He called a series of experts to flatly refute Arnold's testimony. Give you an idea of that, here's Richard Marks, an entertainment lawyer who testified earlier in this trial, and as you'll hear, he held nothing back. And are you familiar with the testimony of Catherine Arnold in this matter? Yes. Have you been asked to analyze that testimony and provide opinions in response? Yes.

And generally, what are those opinions? Well, my opinions are that she's very slick and smooth, but she's not an expert in deal-making. Her assessment of damages is built on nothing, and it's wildly speculative. Are you familiar with Ms. Arnold's opinion that it's customary for an actor to renegotiate the fee for a subsequent picture? option in a multi-picture contract when a film is successful? Yes, I heard that opinion. And are you also familiar with her testimony that under those circumstances, an actor will renegotiate a 50 to 100% increase in their salary for the next optional film?

Yes, I heard her say that. Do you agree with those opinions? Absolutely not. Economic damages expert Mike Spindler, who also previously testified in this trial, agreed that Arnold didn't have adequate support for her calculations. In keeping with that spirit of refuting Herds' experts, intellectual property consultant Doug Bania was called back to the stand, and he also disagreed with not only Arnold, but Herd's social media expert, Ron Schnell.

And Bania said there was no correlation between Waldman's statements and an increase in an anti-Hird social media campaign or anti-herd social media hashtags, and that you couldn't compare Hurd's career to certain other A-list actors. Now, it should be noted that Herds' attorneys cross-examine these rebuttal witnesses. They got marks to concede. He may never have even really negotiated a superhero film before, so who is he to say? Mike Spindler admitted he wasn't testifying about what Amber Heard's damages should be. And they questioned Banny about why he excluded data in his analysis.

But we have to talk right now about psychiatrist Dr. Richard Shaw. And as you might recall from our last podcast, Hurd's witness psychiatrist Dr. David Spiegel was an interesting character. He testified that Depp exhibited signs of substance abuse disorder, behavior consistent with being a perpetrator of intimate partner violence. He spoke about the cognitive deficits of Depp, and he provided some kind of colorful, controversial testimony. Like when he criticized Depp for using an earpiece on movies, showing his cognitive decline, and when he was asked if Marlon Brando had used one as well, he comes back and says, wait, isn't he dead?

Which is kind of a strange response and a strange response from an expert. But the big issue with Spiegel was that he was opining on someone that he never met with personally. He never met with Depp. Well, Dr. Richard Shaw took a major issue with that. My opinion is that he violated the ethical principles that are outlined in the Goldwater rule when he gave his opinions about Mr. Depp, specifically with relationship to personality traits and his cognitive abilities. My second primary opinion would be that

that the Dr. Spiegel's opinions were unreliable and that he had insufficient information. Now later on, Depp called Morgan Knight. So Morgan Knight owned the Hicksville Trailer Palace in Joshua Tree, California. Amber heard had testified that this was the site, of where Depp sexually violated her through a cavity search and completely trashed the trailer. But listen to what Knight observed.

Mr. Knight, will you please just explain for us what you observed when you saw Mr. Depp and Ms. Hurd having an argument? Yes. So Ms. Hurd asked him to go talk off to the side, and she was upset at him, and she was yelling at him. um and i personally had been objection all right i'll sustain me objection okay you could just explain to the jury um what you observed when you saw mr dapp and miss heard having an argument okay um he was kind of cowering and seemed almost afraid and um it was really like odd to see because he was older than her, obviously. So, but I just went back in the house because I didn't want to. Objection. You went to what he did.

All right. That's sustained as to. Understood. So after you observed the argument, fair to say you went back to your house on site? Yes, I did. Yeah. Okay. What happened after that? So when I saw Mr. Depp on my next rounds, he apologized. profusely and said, I'm really sorry about that. She was upset. Objection, Your Honor, hearsay. Sustain? Next question. What if any type of reaction did Mr. Depp have? He was just really...

Objection, Your Honor, hearsay. He's going to say it again. It's the reaction. It's not the statement. All right, if you could make that clear, that's fine. Just what type of physical reaction did Mr. Depp have after the argument between Mr. Depp and Ms. Heard? He honestly, throughout the rest of the night became a lot more quiet and was just very more petulant. In the beginning of the night, he was a lot more outgoing and extroverted. And as the course the night went on, he was less and less so and more quiet. Knight even went on to say that the actress's behavior triggered him because he himself was in an emotionally abusive relationship.

Now, obviously, her side objected to that, but it's still out there. And he also said that the trailer wasn't destroyed. There was a broken sconce, only cost about $62 to repair, which Depp did pay back, but not the scene that Herd portrayed. However, Mr. Knight is a curious figure himself. Before he was called as a witness, he took it upon himself to write someone on Twitter about the trial, and that Hurd's Joshua Tree account, quote, never happened. He tweeted, I was with him all night.

Amber was the one acting all jealous and crazy. Hmm. Is he a credible witness? If you're listening to us and we love that you are, I have to tell you about something that you're also going to love. Our friends at Red Handed. It is a British podcast that you really have to check out because it's full of true crime, conspiracy, murder,

and some of the most shocking stories across the globe. Every week, Sir Rudy and Hannah take a fresh look at a case from the recent, or maybe not. not so recent past. They talk everything from Scientology to the assassination of Kim Jong-un's brother. They really get into the psychology of some bad people like killers, cannibals, even cults. They even do a deep dive into Italy's first female serial killer that murdered women and turned them into soap. You can go back, you can listen to every single one of their 200-plus episodes. Wherever you get your podcast, you just search for red-handed. That's R-E-D-H-A-N-D.

and you check them out on Instagram and Twitter to keep up with new episodes. Moving on from Mr. Knight, we have to talk about the testimony of Jennifer Howell. Now, Amber heard Sister Whitney used to work for Howell, and we recall that Whitney testified that she was there when Depp tried to attack her, that Amber stepped in to protect her, and she claims that she saw Depp manhandle Amber and hit Amber repeatedly in the head. Well, Howell was asked about an email that she sent to Whitney that was quite revealing. This is an email, Ms. Howell, that you sent to Whitney Henriquez on her about Tuesday, July 28th, 2020, at 1120, excuse me, at 11.02 a.m. It is.

This is a true and accurate copy of an email exchange that you sent to Ms. Enriquez? Yes, I believe I'm the one who gave that. Yes, it is. And then did you forward the email exchange and the attachments to Marcel Parasow? Yeah, I asked him to keep it for me. Why did you send this email and letter to Ms. Enriquez? Because I've struggled very much with what to do in a situation that I love someone who I know is doing something very wrong. And I know that they're doing it because they're.

trying to protect their sister. And I'm trying to protect her. And I'm just trying to get her to wake up and do the right thing, which is tell the truth. It's the only thing they can help everybody involved in this case. So she didn't get into more of what that meant exactly. And the tape deposition was cut short. But what we do know through court documents is that Howell explained in a prior declaration that Whitney confessed to her that Hurd was the one who was going to kill death that day, and that she was the aggressor, and that Whitney also admitted that Amber was the one who was responsible for cutting off Depp's finger. Now, just one final cherry on top of this rebuttal day, the last witness that Depp called was a representative from the Children's Hospital of Los Angeles,

and she testified that Amber Heard did not donate the $3.5 million that she pledged to donate, but only donated $250,000, which Depp is using to show that Herd never intended to use the divorce settlement for charitable purposes, as she promised, but instead she pocketed the money, that she is a liar, she's opportunistic, and always after the money. What a day. But we can't forget that tomorrow is possibly also a very big day. The testimony of Kate Moss and possibly Johnny Depp going back on the stand. Thanks for joining us here on Sidebar. Please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts.

I'm Jesse Weber. Speak to you next time. You can binge all episodes of this long crime series, ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.