Amber Heard’s Attorney: She’ll Appeal Johnny Depp Verdict, Jury Swayed by Social Media Vitriol

Elaine Bredehoft, Amber Heard’s attorney in her defamation trial against Johnny Depp, appeared on “Today” in the aftermath of the verdict and said Heard will “absolutely” want to appeal the jury’s decision that was in favor of Depp. Bredehoft added, “She has some excellent grounds for it.”

“She was demonized here,” Bredehoft added about Heard. “A number of things were allowed in this court that should not have been allowed, and it caused the jury to be confused. We weren’t allowed to tell them about the U.K. judgment.”

Bredehoft is referring to the libel case Depp lost in the United Kingdom. The “Pirates of the Caribbean” actor sued The Sun for calling him a “wife beater” but lost the case. Heard testified during that trial.

Heard was ordered to pay $10.35 million in damages to Depp ($10 million in compensatory damages and $350,000 in punitive damages) after the jury ruled that she defamed Depp when she wrote a 2018 Washington Post op-ed alluding to her past claims of domestic violence. The jury also ruled that Depp defamed Heard in the course of fighting back against her charges. The jury awarded Heard $2 million in compensatory damages for her counterclaim.

Bredehoft also shared her belief that the vitriol Heard received on social media during the course of the trial most likely impacted the jury. Social media was largely on Depp’s side, as evidenced by the viral TikTok trend in which users widely mocked Heard’s testimonies.

When asked if social media impacted the jury, Bredehoft replied: “Absolutely. Jurors [weren’t supposed to be looking at social media], but how can you not [be aware]? They went home every night. They have families. Their families are on social media. We had a 10-day break in the middle because of the judicial conference. There is no way they couldn’t have been influenced by it. It was was horrible. It was really, really lopsided. I was against cameras in the courtroom and I went on record with that and argued against it because of the sensitive nature of this. It made it a zoo.”

Watch Bredehoft’s appearance on “Today” in the videos below.

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