Severed finger, stubbed cigarettes, scratches and a sick ‘prank’: court hears Johnny Depp’s graphic claims against ex Amber Heard

Johnny Depp’s former wife threw a bottle that severed his finger, court hears, as he gives graphic account of tempestuous marriage.

Johnny Depp outside court, left; on a gurney with a severed finger in picture tendered to court by his legal team, top right; and Depp's ex, actress Amber Heard, arriving at court with a covering on her face to protect against COVID-19. Pictures: AFP/Supplied/AFP

A graphic photograph of Johnny Depp’s severed finger was shown in court as evidence of his former wife’s alleged violence towards him during their tempestuous marriage.

The Hollywood actor met Amber Heard when she auditioned for the 2011 comedy The Rum Diary and as their relationship developed they secretly recorded what each claims was evidence of the other’s violent behaviour.

“She was beautiful, seemingly incredibly interested in me and my work, and I fell for it. She bombed me with what appeared to be love,” Depp said in a witness statement describing their early days together. “It was not until much later that I understood that she had an agenda, namely to get married to me in order to progress her own career and/or to benefit financially.”

‘She is calculating, dishonest’

Depp claimed that Heard had repeatedly said how much she admired his films, but later admitted she had never watched any of them.

“She is a calculating, diagnosed borderline personality; she is sociopathic; she is a narcissist; and she is completely emotionally dishonest,” he told the High Court.

“I am now convinced that she came into my life to take from me anything worth taking, and then destroy what remained of it.”

Australian attack

Depp claimed that the middle finger of his right hand was severed and a cigarette stubbed out on his cheek during an argument while shooting the fifth film in the Pirates of the Caribbean series in Australia in 2015. The couple had caused controversy on their arrival in the country after allegedly breaching quarantine rules by failing to declare their Yorkshire terriers, Boo and Pistol.

“Amber severed my finger with the second of two thrown vodka bottles at me in the early afternoon,” he said. “Amber claims this was on the second day of a ‘three-day hostage situation’. Amber claims that during these three days, I subjected her to a variety of what sounds like torture and other abuse. These sick claims are completely untrue.”

Depp and then-wife Amber Heard pose for photographers on the red carpet for the premiere of Black Mass on October 11, 2015. Depp is suing News Group Newspapers (NGN) over an April 2018 article in The Sun newspaper that claimed he had been violent to his former wife. Picture: Justin Tallis/AFP

The actor, 57, is suing the publisher of The Sun for libel over an article that called him a “wife beater”. News Group relies on 14 alleged incidents of domestic violence, including what Heard calls a “three-day hostage situation”.

Depp admitted to writing on a mirror and walls in blood and paint, adding: “There was an incident once where Amber lied to me about [the actor] Billy Bob Thornton, so I wrote his name.”

Punched in the face

He described how Heard had allegedly become “verbally aggressive” during a private chartered flight in late 2014 or early 2015 when she called him a “pussy” and “spineless” for “running away” from fights with her. “Then she became physically violent and repeatedly punched me in the face,” he said. He locked himself in the bathroom for the rest of the flight, he added.

The court was read an extract of a recording in September 2015 during which Heard is heard telling Depp: “You got hit … but I did not punch you. I did not f***ing deck you. I f***ing was hitting you.”

Heard then goes on to say, “You are a f***ing baby”, to which Depp says: “Because you start physical fights.” Heard replied: “You are such a baby. Grow the f*** up.”

Fights recorded

Depp said that he recorded Heard because her later recollection of their conversations would sometimes be “radically different”.

Heard had said that she recorded their conversations “to remind Johnny of what he would do when using drugs and alcohol because he wouldn’t remember, or deny, what he had said”.

A video recorded on her mobile telephone at their home in West Hollywood shows Depp swearing and kicking kitchen cupboards. He accepted that he had been drinking red wine for breakfast before the pair appeared to tussle over the telephone.

“I was violent with some cupboards,” he added. “Clearly, I wasn’t in the best state of mind.”

At one point Mr Justice Nicol reminded Depp to remain calm in court when the actor struggled to find a document. He replied: “Absolutely, my lord, I am easy to roll with the punches.”

‘Air of violence’

Depp disputed an account of Ellen Barkin, his co-star in the 1998 movie of Hunter S Thompson’s book Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Barkin said in a statement given in relation to separate legal proceedings in the US that Depp was “a jealous man, controlling” and had an “air of violence” around him.

“I had a scratch on my back once which got him very angry because he insisted it came from having sex with a person who wasn’t him,” she said.

Barkin, 66, said that Depp was frequently “high” during filming and threw a bottle towards her during a fight with an assistant in a hotel room.

Depp told the court that he had not had a fight with an assistant, saying: “I don’t want to call anybody a liar but that incident did not happen.”

He was questioned about an incident when he was arrested for threatening photographers with a piece of wood outside the Mirabelle restaurant in Mayfair, central London, in January 1999. Sick faeces ‘prank’

The actor told the court that he was with his heavily pregnant partner, the singer Vanessa Paradis, during the filming of Sleepy Hollow. “I didn’t want something so sacred to be treated as fodder for newspapers,” he said.

Depp said that he resolved to seek a divorce after Heard or one of her friends defecated in the shared bed of their penthouse apartment in Hollywood. He claimed that Heard had told their estate manager “that leaving the faeces in the bed had been ‘just a harmless prank’.”

The hearing continues.

The Times