In the aftermath of the dramatic Johnny Depp-Amber Heard defamation trial, one of the jurors has spoken out about what made the jury decide in favor of Depp.
The juror, who was not named, told ABC’s “Good Morning America” in an interview that aired Thursday that Heard did not seem credible.
“It didn’t come across as believable,” he said of the actress’ testimony. “It seemed like she was able to flip the switch on her emotions. She would answer one question and she would be crying, and two seconds later she would turn ice cold. It didn’t seem natural.”
However, Depp “just seemed a little more real in terms of how he responded to questions,” the juror said.
The actor sued his ex-wife for defamation after she wrote a 2018 Op-Ed for The Washington Post claiming that she was “a public figure representing domestic abuse.”
Heard did not specifically name Depp but suggested she was victimized by him.
After a six-week trial in Fairfax, Virginia, the jury on June 1 awarded Depp $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages, NBC News reported.
Meanwhile, Heard received $2 million in compensatory damages in her countersuit.
Overall, the jury concluded that “they were both abusive to each other,” the juror told “Good Morning America,” but he said Heard’s team failed to prove Depp’s abuse was physical.
Do you agree with the jury’s decision?
“They had their husband-wife arguments,” the juror said. “They were both yelling at each other. I don’t think that makes either of them right or wrong. That’s what you do when you get into an argument, I guess. But to rise to the level of what she was claiming, there wasn’t enough or any evidence that really supported what she was saying.”
He said the jury essentially dismissed all witnesses on both sides who were employees, paid experts, friends or family members.
Based on other evidence and testimonies, the juror said, the majority of the seven-member jury considered Heard the aggressor in the relationship.
“If you have a battered wife or spouse situation, why would you buy the other person, the ‘aggressor,’ a knife? If you really wanted to help Johnny Depp get off drugs, why are you taking drugs around him?” he said, referring to the testimony that Heard had bought him a knife as a gift.
Heard’s defense also tried to highlight Depp’s drug and alcohol use, but the juror said the evidence provided did not convince the jury.
“If you mix alcohol and marijuana, that’s where you usually end up — passed out,” he said. “We discussed at length that a lot of the drugs she said he used, most of them were downers. And you usually don’t get violent on downers. You become a zombie, as those pictures show.”
The juror also blamed Heard’s legal team for giving her bad advice, such as looking directly at the jury when responding to questions.
“All of us were very uncomfortable” with that, he said.
He also made it clear that the jury’s decision was based on the evidence.
“Some people said we were bribed. That’s not true. Social media did not impact us. We followed the evidence. We didn’t take into account anything outside [the courtroom]. We only looked at the evidence,” the juror said. “They were very serious accusations and a lot of money involved. So we weren’t taking it lightly.”
He added that none of them was starstruck by either celebrity.
The juror said he knew of Depp more than Heard but he hadn’t seen many of the actor’s films.
“None of us were really fans of either one of them,” he said.
