Amber Heard has fired the attorney who represented her in her failed defamation lawsuit against Johnny Depp, during the actors’ appeal of the judgement.
Elaine Charlson Bredehoft, who defended Heard throughout the six-week slander trial, has parted company with the Aquaman star. During the appeal process, attorneys David L. Axelrod and Jay Ward Brown, who previously represented The New York Times in a defamation case against 2008 vice presidential contender Sarah Palin, will take over.
The duo is employed by Ballard Spahr and has covered a variety of matters, including those involving high-stakes civil litigation, First Amendment disputes, journalists, and the media.
Heard’s spokesman released the following statement in response to the verdict: “When it comes to safeguarding the basic right to Freedom of Speech, we see the jury’s judgment not as “the beginning of the end,” but rather as “the end of the beginning.”
As so much new material has just come to light, a different court requires a different strategy of representation.
Heard, 36, was forced to pay her ex-husband more than $10 million in damages after a jury determined she defamed Depp in a 2018 newspaper opinion article.
Bredhoft said in an interview with the Today Show that the actress was unable to pay the millions in damages she owed Depp after the decision. After more than a month, Heard’s legal team appealed the judgment to the Virginia Court of Appeals in Fairfax County. Bredehoft said, “Now is the ideal moment to transmit the baton.”
I have promised my full cooperation and help to Amber and her appellate team as they go ahead on the road to triumph.
Ben Rottenborn will continue to serve as a member of Heard’s legal team.
Throughout the defamation trial, Bredehoft garnered compassion from Depp supporters who stated she was ‘depleted,’ in light of claims that Heard had engaged in yelling battles with her legal team outside the courthouse.
After Heard’s testimony in May, in which the attorney struggled under questioning, the number of online messages of support for Bredehoft surged.
Camille Vasquez, Depp’s attorney, objected to every other question Bredehoft tried to ask Heard during cross-examination on her penultimate day of testimony.
Multiple times prior to the widely known case, the Judge supported Vasquez’s objections, leading Bredehoft to halt mid-question several times.
“I am trying here, I am attempting…” Bredehoft spoke with a dissatisfied sigh. Depp, 59, was granted $10 million to $15 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive penalties at the conclusion of the defamation trial.
The court eventually restricted the damages at $350,000, leaving Depp with a total of $8.35 million.
In the meanwhile, one of Heard’s three countersuit allegations linked to remarks made by Depp’s attorney indicating that the actress and her companions had wrecked their flat prior to contacting the police was successful. Out of the $100 million she requested, the actress was given $2 million in compensatory damages.
A day after Heard’s legal team filed an appeal, Depp’s legal team did the same in an attempt to overturn the couple million dollars the star owes to his ex-wife.
The team representing the Pirates of the Caribbean star said that they filed an appeal to ensure that ‘all information is examined by the court’ when they return to hear Heard’s appeal.
Before launching an appeal, Heard’s counsel requested that the verdict be overturned and a new trial be declared. It was contended that one of the jurors should not have been allowed to serve since his summons was meant for his father, who had the same name and address.
The plea was denied by Judge Penny Azcarate, who said that there was no “proof of fraud or misconduct” by the juror and that the jury’s judgment should remain.