Amber Heard Files for Bankruptcy After Defamation Case

Amber Heard has filed for bankruptcy after failing to pay her ex-husband Johnny Depp the defamation trial settlement handed to her by the court of Virginia.

She has also issued an appeal with the court about the state of her finances and bowed out from the settlement payment.

Heard’s legal team addressed their client's financial constraints previously and voiced concerns about her inability to pay her ex-husband the $10 million settlement.

In the petition, she seeks nullity of the entire verdict due to her financial situation.

She recently sold her Yucca Valley house for $1,050,000. The Santa Fe-style home was bought by an unnamed trust that somehow had connections to Heard back in 2019 for over $570,000.

In June, a seven-person jury handed down the verdict in Virginia and found that Depp had been defamed by three statements in a 2018 Washington Post op-ed she wrote about her experience with domestic abuse and described herself as “a public figure representing domestic abuse”.

Depp was seeking $50 million in damages, but the jury has awarded him $15 million — $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages.

However, Judge Penney Azcarate reduced the punitive damages figure to $350,000, the maximum allowed in the state, which makes Depp’s total haul around $10.4 million.

The jury, consisting of five men and two women, also concluded that Heard was defamed by a lawyer for Depp who accused her of creating a detailed hoax surrounding the abuse allegations. She was awarded $2 million in compensatory damages to Heard, but $0 in punitive damages.

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