Johnny Depp’s lawyers claim Amber Heard told a “calculated and manipulative lie” about donating her 5-point-5 million pound divorce settlement to charity.
The actor’s trying to overturn last year’s libel case in the UK, ruling that he assaulted his ex-wife.
His representatives say they have fresh evidence and have asked for permission to appeal the judgment – but no decision’s being made today.
Following a three-week trial in July last year, Mr Justice Nicol ruled that Mr Depp, 57, assaulted Ms Heard, 34, on a dozen occasions and put her in “fear for her life” three times.
The judge found that an April 2018 column calling Mr Depp a “wife beater” was “substantially true”.
However the actor claims he “did not receive a fair trial” and is applying for permission to appeal against the ruling at the Royal Courts of Justice in London on Thursday.
His barrister applied for permission to rely on “fresh evidence” that Ms Heard did not donate her divorce settlement to charity.
After the couple divorced in 2016, Ms Heard said she would split the seven million US dollars between the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and the American Civil Liberties Union.
But, Mr Caldecott said, the hospital wrote to Mr Depp’s business adviser in 2019 to say Ms Heard had not made “any payments”.
The court heard she gave just 100,000 dollars to the hospital and 450,000 dollars to the ACLU, although she claims she made a further 500,000 dollar donation to the second charity anonymously.
In written submissions, Mr Caldecott said the pledges “strengthened Ms Heard’s credit in an exceptional way”.
But, he added, that was a “calculated and manipulative lie, designed to achieve a potent favourable impression from the outset”.
