It’s been over a week since Johnny Depp and Amber Heard reached a divorce settlement, but it looks like these the legal head-butting shows no signs of letting up.
Bizarrely, the latest trouble began when Heard announced plans to donate her spousal support to charity.
Many interpreted the move as a middle finger to Depp, as well as to his defenders who insisted that her claims of domestic abuse were financially motivated.
Depp countered by offering to cut out the middle man and give the $ 7 million to charity himself.
Not surprisingly, Heard’s legal team was not thrilled by this proposal, as it not only makes Depp out to be the good guy, but suggests to the public that she couldn’t be trusted to make the donation herself.
As a bonus, Depp would be able to write the payments of as charitable donations, a move that would save him big bucks on his taxes.
Amber and her attorneys reportedly saw right through the move, and now they’re saying they want Depp to fork over twice the original settlement amount.
Yes, according to TMZ Heard is demanding $ 14 million from Depp if he wants to make the payments directly to the charities instead of to Amber.
“If Johnny wishes to change the settlement agreement, we must insist that he honor the full amount by donating $ 14M to charity, which after accounting for his tax deduction, is equal to his $ 7M payment obligation to Amber,” a sources tells the website.
Obviously, this puts Depp in the awkward position of either donating a whopping $ 14 mill to the two charities of Amber’s choice (the ACLU and Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles) or sheepishly forking over the original $ 7 million directly to Heard.
Yet again, Depp is one of the year’s top earning actors, so he could easily afford either option, but whatever he chooses, his gambit is seriously backfiring, as thus far it’s only serving to keep his increasingly ugly divorce in the headlines.
With claims of domestic violence and leaked video showing that Depp is at the very least an angry drunk…
…it seems that he would be more concerned with his reputation than with taking petty digs at Heard.
The longer this thing drags on, the more damage it does to both parties careers.
And as one of the world’s biggest movie stars with an estimated $ 48 million in earnings last year, Depp is clearly the one with the most to lose in that respect.
Of course, that may be why he has no qualms about putting Amber through the ringer legally.
It’s hard to scare a man as well-loved and independently wealthy as Johnny Depp.