The jury of seven people reached a decision Wednesday in the defamation case brought by Johnny Depp against his ex-wife Amber Heard.
Johnny Depp won his defamation case against his ex-wife Amber Heard on Wednesday, and the jury awarded him $15 million in damages.
Depp was awarded $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages in his defamation suit. The jury also awarded Heard $2 million in compensatory damages.
The jury in Fairfax, Virginia, began deliberating Friday.
Depp sued Heard for $50 million after she wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post in 2018 in which she called herself a “public figure representing domestic abuse.” Heard counter sued Depp for $100 million.SEE NEW POSTS
Less than an hour after Depp won his defamation case against Heard on Wednesday, he said in a statement that he felt like the “jury gave me my life back.”
But will the jury’s decision help him get his Hollywood career back? In the minds of some public relations experts, that remains to been seen.
In interviews with NBC News on Wednesday, three PR and crisis communications professionals said they felt confident that Depp could get his big-screen acting career back on track. Two other experts expressed more skepticism, pointing out that Depp’s stature in the entertainment industry was diminished even before the trial started and observing that a wide swath of the moviegoing public will continue to believe that Depp subjected Heard to physical abuse over years, regardless of the jury’s ruling.
Howard Breuer, chief executive of Newsroom Public Relations, a firm based in Los Angeles, said he thinks people in the industry will approach working with Depp again with caution.
“I’m sure there will be some factions in Hollywood who will be cautious as long as they know there are people out there who think Amber Heard was telling the truth,” Breuer said. “They’re going to be careful.”
Read more in NBC’s story here.
