With each day that’s passed since Amber Heard filed for divorce from Johnny Depp, a new, more heated story has emerged.
Heard accused Depp of committing acts of domestic violence against her in their marriage, and a number of his friends and associates have rushed to his defense.
In a scathing counter-allegation targeted at Heard, comedian Doug Stanhope accused the actress of trying to blackmail Depp in hopes of a juicy divorce settlement.
Stanhope, a close friend of Depp’s who claimed he was with the couple on the day of the alleged abuse, paints Heard in a malignant light.
“Amber was now going to leave him, threatening to lie about him publicly in any and every possible duplicitous way if he didn’t agree to her terms,” Stanhope wrote in a column for The Wrap.
Heard is not taking the accusations lightly.
She has now filed a defamation lawsuit against the comic, claiming everything he said in the article was false.
An attorney for Heard gave a statement to E! News:
“The Complaint alleges that Stanhope is a close friend of Johnny Depp and, as part of a coordinated effort, wrote a highly defamatory article about Ms. Heard, filled with completely false, highly defamatory and very hurtful statements.
“Ms. Heard seeks the maximum possible jury award, and will donate 100 percent of the proceeds from the lawsuit to Chrysalis, a domestic violence shelter in Arizona, in an effort to counter the setback made to women by the defendants’ defamatory article and related wrongful acts.”
ln addition, court documents state the following:
“Defendants are engaged in a classic case of ‘attacking the victim,’ in an effort to discredit Heard, destroy her good name and reputation, and severely harm her hard-earned entertainment career, on top of the campaign of violence that Depp has inflicted upon her for years.”
This new development is the latest in a string of he said-she said accounts in which one party accuses the other of lying.
Earlier this week, leaked text messages from Heard to Depp’s assistant Stephen Deuters revealed a conversation that seemed to confirm an abusive incident from two years ago.
But shortly after the leak, Deuters claimed no such texts existed and he was not aware of any abuse in the marriage.
The only thing we know for sure in this case is that someone is lying, but at this juncture, it’s impossible to know who.
While friends and fans are all taking sides in the matter, the fact remains that the only people who know what truly happened are Heard and Depp.
