What was actually done at and the downtown LA penthouse six years ago was reintroduced today in the former star's $50 million defamation lawsuit against his ex-wife.
Officer Melissa Saenz, who waited in the packed Virginia courtroom to see the video, said, "I did not identify her (Heard) as a victim of domestic violence."
On May 21, 2016, under pressure from the defense team, a March 21021 deposition showed the 12-year LAPD vet detailing her experience entering and observing the couple's South Broadway home around 9 PM PT. At the conclusion of the brief-ish visit, Officer Saenz did not submit a report but described the incident as closed because there was, in her opinion, no crime.
Saenz admitted that neither she nor her partner took any notes or photos of his visit to the Depp-Heard home. She also admitted she was "crying," red faced, and not making eye contact when they arrived, but said in Depp's failed 2020 libel lawsuit against The Sun, Saenz was completely defying for the lack of notes and photos, and assumptions about his condition.
In a 2021 deposition, Heard's lawyer and Saenz were feuding, both denied telling her partner "that was crazy."
Both Saenz and her trainee partner Officer Tyler Hadden deposed in Depp and Herd's divorce proceedings in 2016 on what they saw and deduced from seeing and deduced from being on the scene at the then couple's DTLA residence on May 21, 2016 in response to a LAPD dispatch.
Saenz said she "interviewed Ms. Heard and "closely examined her face" six years ago, Heard said she "told her she was not hurt nor was Ms. Heard lodged a complaint against Mr. Depp."
The playing of Saenz's old deposition continues with lawyers questioning her next and then some cross examination. It's likely that the recording of the portion of the video will take the court until past 5 PM ET, which traditionally occurs when Judge Penny Azcarate comes to an end.
We hear that tomorrow will likely be packed with additional depositions from LAPD officers and people who worked in the DTLA building where Depp and Heard lived in 2016.
Dr. Shannon Curry, a not board certified forensic psychologist, informed the court earlier today as a result of Depp's claim that she considered Heard to have Borderline Personality Disorder and Histrionic Personality Disorder. After a dinner at the actor's house with them, Curry and his right-hand man and former attorney Adam Waldman created her diagnosis in bulk following a 12-hour session with the actress late last year.
She said she provided Heard with a test that included 567 statements she had to answer false or false. Curry continued to show that others with similar scores as Heard demonstrated traits such as internalization of blame, inner anger, and hostility. She told the court that people with borderline disorder "can react violently."
Curry said, In these situations, they will often be abusive to their partners. She said she can use what she called administrative violence or making threats that she will utilize the legal system, such as filing a restraining order.
After Tuesday's lunch break, head lawyer Elaine Bredehoft was caught off guard for her apparent closeness to the Depp camp and the "coincidence" of her diagnosis, which corresponded to the taunts depicted by the Edward Scissorhands actor against Heard, as played for the court in audio recordings yesterday.
Curry, who was quoted from the psychologist's deposition earlier this year, admitted that she has never agreed or reached an agreement that Ms. Heard "exhibits behavior that suggests her allegations of abuse against Mr. Depp were false." Designation documents submitted by the Depp team suggested otherwise, as the defense attorney took no small pleasure in pointing out.
Curry's three to four hour long dinner and meeting, which he had at Depp's house before being retained, was a topic under investigation for several years. Specifically, how extremely irregular it is in such a setting and the gathering itself being not being revealed in any documents in the case.
With a lot of time spent in the minutiae and in reference to other doctors' notes, Bredehoft was attempting to demonstrate bias on this ninth day of the much delayed trial on this date. At this point, whether or not Bredehoft succeeded in making that point of bias to the jury, however, it is difficult to discern. According to Heard, the POV that a relationship characterized by abuse over four years can lead non only to trauma but symptoms similar to those that Dr Curry identified.
Dr. Jessica Taylor, a certified psychologist, described the Borderline Personality Disorder label as "predictable and lazy." It's "so far away," and she claims that the label "Memory Heard" was used in secret and deliberately, as it is against many women witnessing their male abusers in court."
Tara Roberts, who manages Depp's estate in the Bahamas, told the court on Tuesday that "Amber was advising him he was going to die a fat, lonely old man." Roberts denied ever seeing Depp blotto drunk, but stated underwent cross examination that in 2013 the actor was "passed out on the beach." The incident was so serious that the staffer requested for Heard and Depp's two small children to leave the island fairly soon afterwards.
Depp said that he was often subjected to domestic abuse in his relationship with Heard, and not the other way around.
The former Oscar nominee filed a lawsuit in March 2019 against his Rum Diary co-star in Virginia because of a late 2018 Washington Post op-ed Heard, which admitted to being a victim of domestic abuse. At the same time, though, the op-ed in the Jeff Bezos-owned broadsheet never mentioned Depp by name.
Depp, still fresh in the midst of several litigations at the time, stated that the article was clearly referring to him. Depp said the previous actor insisted that the op-ed would cost him excellent pay-raising positions, a return to the Pirates franchise, and "devastated" his career.
The defense claims that after a fiasco and box office deception of 2017's Dead Men, Disney had already removed the request for Depp to appear in another Pirates film, but that even if he were offered "$300 million," or he would leave him out. What is important here is that the case goes to the root of any dreadful offense that Depp is seeking from Heard in the already high standard of defamation.
Heard unsuccessfully attempted to dismiss the proceedings in the Old Dominion case in the summer of 2020. Depp himself fought for $100 million in the UK libel trial against Rupert Murdoch's The Sun tabloid in late 2020. Of course, Depp himself failed in the UK libel trial against him for he being a "wife-beater."
Both the countersuit and the British case loom over the proceedings in the Fairfax County Courthouse today. Depp completed his several days of testimony on his own behalf. Every day, Heard is expected to take the stand herself in the next week or so.
