Johnny Depp Has A New Legal Issue To Worry About
Johnny Depp and Amber Heard have spent the last few years embroiled in an ongoing legal battle against each other. The basis of the current suit revolves around an 2018 op-ed written by Heard and published in The Washington Post. In the piece, Heard claimed to be the survivor of an abusive relationship. She never named Depp in the article, but the actor claims that she made it clear the piece was about him. Depp is now suing Heard for defamation in a Virginia court. Depp has alleged that Heard's claims of abuse are false and that they have cost him career opportunities which have, in turn, caused him to lose money. Heard is countersuing Depp on similar grounds based on his attorney's comments that she made false allegations.
It's a big mess, and like so many other celebrity trials, it has become a bonafide media circus. Heard has found herself on the receiving end of widespread online hate as Depp's devoted fan base rallies around him. Though Depp seems to have more public support, he is far from in the clear.
As his case against Heard goes to the jury for deliberation, Depp faces yet another legal issue — this time from ACLU.
Johnny Depp could owe a lot of money
It seems like everyone has been dragged into the Amber Heard-Johnny Depp case. Everyone from Elon Musk to Eddie Redmayne has been named or involved in one way or another, per The Independent. The American Civil Liberties Union is part of that ever-growing list, too, and according to Radar Online, the ACLU wants a whopping $86,000 from Depp for its involvement in the case.
Court documents revealed that Heard promised to pay $3.5 million to the ACLU from her divorce with Depp. However, an ACLU representative testified that Heard only paid a little over a million of the promised amount. Now, the ACLU is demanding Depp cover the expenses involved with providing evidence. As the motion put it (per Radar Online), "While [the organization and its attorneys] cannot get back the significant time they spent responding to Mr. Depp's subpoenas and the disruption to their work," so they deserve to be paid back in full.
Depp and Heard stand to lose more than money when all is said and done. "Hollywood is a strange place," a PR expert told CNN of the damage to their careers after the legal controversy. "When you air your dirty laundry in front of the machine, the executives, all the people that make the parts move, they sort of recoil from a hot flame."