'YOU'RE THE ONE!' Camille Vasquez grills Amber Heard on claim she was violated with a bottle by Johnny Depp
Warning: The article contains details of incidents of sexual and domestic abuse which can be triggering to some readers.
On Tuesday, May 17, Johnny Depp’s lawyer grilled Amber Heard on her claim that Depp sexually assaulted her with a liquor bottle. The lawyer also presented apparent love notes in which the 'Aquaman' actress wrote she wanted to “rip” him apart.
Depp’s attorney Camille Vasquez began the second day of cross-examining Heard by asking her about her claim that Depp violated her with a bottle of Maker’s Mark bourbon during a fight in March 2015, when the two were married. Vasquez asked why there were no medical records of the abuse. “I didn’t seek treatment,” Heard said in Fairfax County Circuit Court in Virginia.
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As Vasquez pushed Heard on the progression of the fight that night, she said she cannot remember the exact sequence of events. “As I have always said, I don’t remember exactly what happened first, or the sequence,” she said. Heard had testified earlier that she feared the bottle inserted inside her was broken, but a photo taken after the alleged assault, presented in court, showed the bottle was intact.
However, Depp has claimed that he was the victim and not Heard. He maintained that he lost the tip of his middle finger when Heard threw a vodka bottle at him. He alleged that he then tried to hide from Heard, who went around the house looking for him, banging on doors.
“You’re the one who assaulted someone with a bottle in Australia, isn’t that right, Ms. Heard?” Vasquez asked. “You weren’t scared of him at all, were you?” “I didn’t assault Johnny in Australia. I didn’t assault Johnny ever,” Heard responded.
Heard's earlier testimony on the 'bottle assault'
In a harrowing testimony just days ago, Heard recalled in court how Depp allegedly inserted a liquor bottle inside her during a fight, an incident which she claims left her really scared. Breaking down into tears, Heard said, "I didn’t know if the bottle he had inside me was broken. I couldn’t feel it. I couldn’t feel anything.”
Heard said the incident took place in March 2015 while the then-married pair was staying in Australia. At the time, Depp was filming the fifth installment of the 'Pirates of the Caribbean' movie franchise. The two had an argument about drinking and Depp allegedly began taunting Heard with a liquor bottle in his hand. As she went to grab it, the bottle dropped to the floor and shattered. "That really set him off,” Heard said, recalling how she ended up on the ground. “I stand up [and] he’s got a bottle in his hand. He threw it at me.” She says he cornered her in the bar area of the home and started throwing bottles at her, with glass breaking all around.
“I don’t know how much time passed, but at some point, he had a broken bottle of against my face neck area by my jawline, and he told me he’d cut up my face," Heard added. Depp allegedly started ripping up her nightgown while punching the wall next to her head. “I was naked, slipping around on this tile” on the floor, she told the jury. “He’s screaming at me and saying I ruined his life.” “’I f**king hate you. You ruined my f**king life,’” Depp screamed while he smashed a phone “to smithereens,” Heard said.
She claimed during one of Depp's alleged violent outbursts he continued to threaten he would "f**king kill me" over and over again while penetrating her with the bottle, she said she was bleeding from her privates.
In one of the most harrowing moments of the testimony, the actress struggled to maintain her composure on the stand as she detailed: "Next thing I remember I was bent over backwards on the bar, I was staring at the blue light. My back was on the countertop. I thought he was punching me. I felt this pressure on my pubic bone and I could feel his arm moving. It looked like he was punching me. I could just feel this pressure. I don't remember what I said, I just remember being really still, not wanting to move. I remember looking around the room, looking at all the broken bottles, broken glass and I remember not wanting to move because I didn't know if it was broken, I didn't know if the bottle that he had inside me was broken. I couldn't feel it, I didn't feel pain, I didn't feel anything." "I just remember being in the bathroom. I remember retching, the sound my voice was making. I lost control of my bladder. I remember just retching, there was blood on the floor."
Heard's alleged love notes to Depp
Vasquez also asked Heard about love notes she wrote to Depp in the months after the alleged assault. “True love isn’t just about the madness of passion … it’s about your best friend,” she wrote in one missive to her husband. “I want to rip you apart.” The handwritten note was signed "Slim", which is a name Depp used to address her back at the time. In another letter, Heard wrote to Depp that he was the “last person I ever meant to hurt” and “there is never a good enough reason to hurt you.”
Heard claimed that she believed Depp was committed to sobriety after the alleged fight in Australia. She said that most of the assaults and abuse happened when Depp was under the influence of drugs or alcohol. “When things were good, they were really good,” she said.
The trial is now in its fifth week. Depp and Heard are squaring off over a 2018 op-ed she wrote for the Washington Post, where she called herself a domestic violence survivor. Depp has claimed that he was booted from the 'Pirates of the Caribbean' franchise because Heard's op-ed clearly implicated that he was the abuser. The article, however, did not mention Depp by name. The actor sued for $50 million and Heard countersued for $100 million, claiming Depp ran a smear campaign for years in an attempt to silence her and destroy her acting career.
Depp and Heard began dating after meeting on the set of the 2011 film 'The Rum Diary'. They got married in Los Angeles in February 2015. In 2016, Heard obtained a restraining order against Depp, accusing him of abuse. Depp, however, denied the claims, saying that her accusations were a "choreographed hoax”. In 2019, the two settled their divorce out of court. At the time, Heard said she had donated her $7m (£5.5m) settlement to charity. Depp later accused her of lying about it.