Amber heard

Attorneys for actor Amber Heard spent much of last week trying to portray her ex-husband, Johnny Depp, as a jealous and drunken abuser who can only blame himself for his nose-diving Hollywood career. Since Heard concluded her testimony in a Virginia courtroom Tuesday, her lawyers have presented witness testimony from people who were once close to Depp but shunted from his orbit. They've included Depp's former longtime agent, the actor Ellen Barkin and Heard's sister. The attorneys' goal: Undermine Depp's libel suit against Heard. The suit claims she falsely portrayed him as a domestic abuser and cost him his lucrative film career, including the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie franchise. Depp points to a 2018 Washington Post op-ed in which Heard described herself as “a public figure representing domestic abuse.” Depp's lawyers say he was defamed by the article even though it never mentioned his name. The trial will enter its sixth week when it resumes Monday. Below are … [Read more...] about Heard’s lawyers try to poke holes in Depp’s libel lawsuit

The legal teams for Johnny Depp and Amber Heard have only one more week to prove their respective clients’ former spouses defamed them in what has been an alternately disturbing and surreal civil trial in Virginia . Over the last five weeks, Fairfax County jurors have heard damning allegations of domestic violence and damaged acting careers. Depp, in his $50 million lawsuit, alleged Heard “devastated” his career when she penned a 2018 Washington Post op-ed. In the piece, which did not mention Depp by name but came two years after she sought a restraining order against him, Heard identified herself as a domestic violence survivor. In her own $100 million counter lawsuit, Heard alleges that Depp and his legal team defamed her by launching a “smear” campaign against her, which included calling her allegations an “abuse hoax.” Throughout the trial, both actors have insisted that they were victims of domestic abuse during a relationship that officially dissolved in 2017—and … [Read more...] about The Bombshell Testimony Looming Over Johnny Depp’s Case

Sign up to get this weekly column as a newsletter. We're looking back at the strongest, smartest opinion takes of the week from CNN and other outlets. (CNN) Shortly after Donald Trump was elected President of the United States, Nobel laureate Toni Morrison wrote in The New Yorker: "Unlike any nation in Europe, the United States holds whiteness as the unifying force. Here, for many people, the definition of 'Americanness' is color." Reflecting on efforts -- largely by White men -- to define themselves by sustaining that poisonous definition, Morrison argues that those "who are prepared to abandon their humanity out of fear of black men and women, suggest the true horror of lost status." In Morrison's formulation, fear-driven devotion to racial status is more powerful to many White Americans than even self-interest, shame or any belief in humanity. And it is this reality, that White Americans' anxieties in the face of a changing country have been and continue to be … [Read more...] about Opinion: US leadership around the world and at home is at a crossroads

Sign up to get this weekly column as a newsletter. We're looking back at the strongest, smartest opinion takes of the week from CNN and other outlets. (CNN) Shortly after Donald Trump was elected President of the United States, Nobel laureate Toni Morrison wrote in The New Yorker: "Unlike any nation in Europe, the United States holds whiteness as the unifying force. Here, for many people, the definition of 'Americanness' is color." Reflecting on efforts -- largely by White men -- to define themselves by sustaining that poisonous definition, Morrison argues that those "who are prepared to abandon their humanity out of fear of black men and women, suggest the true horror of lost status." In Morrison's formulation, fear-driven devotion to racial status is more powerful to many White Americans than even self-interest, shame or any belief in humanity. And it is this reality, that White Americans' anxieties in the face of a changing country have been and continue to be … [Read more...] about Opinion: What a Nobel laureate’s take on Donald Trump reveals about today