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Yesterday, in Fairfax, Virginia, Amber Heard and Johnny Depp were both found liable for defamation in their lawsuits against each other.

A jury awarded damages to both, although Depp’s $15 million ($10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million dollars in punitive damages) far outweighed Heard’s $2 million (compensatory damages, with no punitive damages).

Depp had sought $50 million in damages and Heard had sought $100 million.

However, that $15 million number is a little misleading for a number of reasons. Consider this, via NPR:

The seven-member jury found that Depp is entitled to $10 million in compensatory damages and punitive damages of $5 million. But, because Virginia state law limits punitive damages to $350,000, the actual amount to be awarded Depp is $10.35 million.

So we are down to $10,35 million, and that’s before you minus the $2 million awarded to Heard.

In total, you might say it’s a net gain of $8,35 million. A tidy sum, but a drop in the ocean compared to his overall rumoured net worth of roughly $150 million.

It is unclear at this stage who will be ordered to pay whose legal costs, which could also run into the millions.

There are those who say Depp has cleared his name, which is priceless, but that’s forgetting the 2020 libel case in the UK. To jog your memory, here’s the BBC:

…Depp has lost his libel case against the Sun newspaper over an article that called him a “wife beater”.

Mr Depp, 57, sued the paper after it claimed he assaulted his ex-wife Amber Heard, which he denies. The Sun said the article was accurate.

Judge Mr Justice Nicol said the Sun had proved what was in the article to be “substantially true”.

He found 12 of the 14 alleged incidents of domestic violence had occurred.

Depp appealed the ruling but that was rejected in March of last year.

The next question is whether or not Heard can pay those millions.

Former federal prosecutor Neama Rahmani says Heard has plenty of time to come up with the money, via The Daily Beast:

In Virginia, Depp has up to 30 years to collect his judgment. He added that both sides are entitled to ask for financials if either actor claims they don’t have the funds to pay the judgments.

“I don’t think she can pay. She kept the $7 million [from the divorce settlement with Depp] because she had to pay for legal fees,” Rahmani added. “The question is whether Johnny Depp is really going to enforce the judgment against his ex-wife. Is he really going to take her wages? She may have to raise her bank accounts in order to do so.”

Duncan Levin, a former Manhattan federal prosecutor turned criminal defence lawyer, reckons Depp won’t be cutting Heard any slack:

“Just because she is saying she doesn’t have money doesn’t mean she doesn’t have money,” Levin added. “I fully expect he will try to enforce his rights with the judgment.”

The gloves came off a long time ago. There is likely very little chance that Depp is going to let his ex-wife off the hook after the trial we have just witnessed.

The ruling in the UK and this US ruling have led to questions about how such different conclusions can be reached on similar matters.

Consider this, via The Washington Post:

The reason, according to legal experts, may simply boil down to the fact that Depp’s action in the U.K. — which he lost — happened to be decided by a judge, whereas his case in the United States was decided by a jury.

“The answer is simple,” said George Freeman, executive director of the Media Law Resource Center. “It was up to the jury.”

…Mark Stephens, an international media lawyer familiar with both cases, said Depp’s legal team in the United States ran a strategy known as DARVO — an acronym for deny, attack, and reverse victim and offender — in which Depp became the victim and Heard the abuser.

“We find that DARVO works very well with juries but almost never works with judges, who are trained to look at evidence,” Stephens said.

In that UK ruling, the judge found that “the great majority of alleged assaults … have been proved to the civil standard”.

Although the jurors in the US trial were ordered not to read about the case, they weren’t sequestered, meaning they might have done.

This won’t be the last we hear about the former couple – Heard’s spokesperson has said she will appeal the decision – but perhaps some of the media focus will die down.

We can only hope.

[sources:npr&bbc&dbeast&washpost]