New Delhi: After losing her defamation lawsuit against her ex-husband Johnny Depp, Amber Heard made a major announcement on Instagram. The actor has ended their bitter divorce and released a statement in which she describes how she has lost faith in the American legal system.
"It’s important for me to say that I never chose this. I defended my truth and in doing so my life as a I knew it was destroyed. The vilification I have faced on social media is an amplified version of the ways in which women are re-victimised when they come forward," Heard wrotein her Instagram post.
Amber claimed that she experienced domestic abuse throughout their brief marriage. The Virginia court's lengthy trial resulted in a verdict against the celebrity. She has ultimately chosen to settle the lawsuit despite making repeated attempts to win it. She has consented to pay Depp $1 million.
“I exhausted almost all my resources in advance of and during a trial in which I was subjected to a courtroom in which abundant, direct evidence that corroborated my testimony was excluded and in which popularity and power mattered more than reason and due process. In the interim, I was exposed to a type of humiliation that I simply cannot re-live. Even if my US appeal is successful, the best outcome would be a re-trial where a new jury would have to consider the evidence again. I simply cannot go through that for the third time,” Amber penned in the lengthy statement.
"I will not be threatened, disheartened, or dissuaded by what happened from speaking the truth. No one can and no one will take that from me. My voice forever remains the most valuable asset I have. Thank you. See you soon,” she concluded.
After Heard published an opinion piece in the Washington Post describing herself as a "public figure representing domestic abuse," Johnny Depp initially sued Heard for defamation in March 2019.
Meanwhile, Johnny Depp and Amber Heard first met while filming The Rum Diary in 2009, and they later began dating. The couple tied the knot in 2015.