On the third day of the Johnny Depp versus The Sun trial in London’s High Court, the room heard from Depp’s private doctor, who specializes in addiction. According to the Daily Mail, David Kipper wrote in a letter that The Sun’s lawyer, Sasha Wass, read to the court that Depp “romanticizes the entire drug culture” and pays “lip service” to stars like Elton John “more for their celebrity than their struggle with sobriety.”
On Tuesday, the first day of the trial, Depp copped to taking “every drug under the sun.” He said that John had been an important part of his road to recovery from drug addiction. Detoxing from drugs would become the crux of the third day of questioning. (The trial will determine whether The Sun’s reference to Depp as a “wife beater” in a 2018 headline was libel. The publication’s defense has been going through Heard’s 14 allegations of assault on Depp’s part, while the actor is on the stand. Depp has denied all instances of violence in written and verbal form, and has called past written evidence against him the work of Heard’s elaborate “hoax,” claiming she built a “dossier” over several years in order to paint him as a domestic abuser.)
Depp’s third turn on the stand varied little in theme from the previous two days. In 2014, the couple traveled to Depp’s private island, reportedly worth $3.5 million, according to the Daily Mail’s account of the trial. He was there to detox from the prescription opioid Roxicodone, which he called his “Roxxies.” He wrote in his witness statement that “one of the cruelest things that she has ever done” was withhold detox medication from him. He accused her of leaving him “sobbing like a child” on the floor shaking and with cramps, which he called the “heebie-jeebies.”
But Wass once again presented a different story. She suggested that Heard was acting as nurse, and that by “withholding” drugs she was following instructions from medical professionals. “The idea of a detoxification process is you come off drugs,” she said. “[Heard] was withholding drugs that you were not supposed to have.”
Depp asked, “Why would she have drugs that I was not supposed to have?”
Wass referenced a series of text messages from Heard to a nurse staying on another part of the island: “Issue seems to have arisen again. All of a sudden he’s flipping. He’s screaming, he’s so mad he pushed me and I asked him to get out. Don’t want to keep you guys.”
The nurse asked if she should come over and Heard said yes. When asked why Heard would write that if it was not true, Depp said, “I can only say from my point of view I was in no physical condition to push anyone. I’m denying I pushed her. I’m going to suggest that the testimony is fabricated.”
“And this is part of the hoax is it?” Wass asked.
“I believe it’s part of the dossier that was an insurance policy for her,” Depp said. “I wouldn’t know if she followed the instructions of the nurse to the letter.”
The couple eventually married in 2015.
On Wednesday, the court aired an alleged pattern of jealousy on Depp’s part; Wass described a night when he allegedly backhanded Heard because a piece of art by her ex-partner was still hanging on her wall. (Depp denies that the argument came to blows.) On Thursday, Wass questioned him about his apparent jealousy over James Franco, whom Heard starred with in 2015’s The Adderall Diaries. In the incident described, Depp allegedly called his then girlfriend a “slut and a whore” on a private plane from Boston to L.A. in 2014, according to Metro. He allegedly said she liked “getting f—ed with James Franco” and that she “liked getting f—ed on set.”
Again, Depp denied all instances of violence against Heard, but acknowledged he was uncomfortable with her and Franco working together. He suggested that the jealousy stemmed from Heard describing the actor as a “creepy and rapey.” Per Metro, Wass asked, “She said he was a rapist?” And Depp responded, “She said he was quite aggressive in his advances towards her.”
Depp told the court, “She told me many things that were very, very negative about Mr. Franco, and that he had tried to kiss her and made sexual advances towards her.” When pressed, he said, “It provoked me to become jealous because…it shocked me that she was suddenly so friendly and happy with him.” He admitted to suspecting she and Franco were “having an affair.”
A spokesperson for Heard told Metro, “Ms. Heard denies in no uncertain terms that she ever described James Franco in that way. It is simply untrue.” Franco’s representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
A psychologist who has treated Heard, Connell Cowan, apparently had comment on this back and forth as well, according to the Daily Mail, writing in his medical notes, “JD is very threatened by career, particularly any kind of romantic scenes she has to do. Her movie with JF (James Franco) precipitated a binge that put JD in the hospital,” and “Everyone around J seems to be intimidated by his power and money. No one stands up to him.”
The trial is set to go for three weeks, and Heard will eventually take the stand. The court is expected to hear from character witnesses on Depp’s behalf including his ex-girlfriends Vanessa Paradis and Winona Ryder.
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