Amber Heard’s request for a retrial in her legal battle with Johnny Depp has been rejected.
Judge Penney Azcarate declined to toss the verdict on Wednesday, 13 July.
The judge was responding to several post-trial motions made by Ms Heard’s legal team.
Heard’s lawyers challenged the verdict on the basis that one of the seven jurors who decided the case was never summoned for jury duty, so the defamation trial should be re-run.
Heard’s lawyers filed papers last week that claimed “newly discovered facts and information” about the juror meant the much-publicised verdict should be declared void.
They said one of those originally summoned to be on the jury, a 77-year-old man, had not appeared and had been replaced by his son – who has the same name and lives at the same address.
(Image: POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
Her team also argued the verdict was not supported by evidence presented during the trial, claiming the jury failed to focus on the fallout from the Washington Post article that the trial revolved around.
Judge Azcarate said the juror issue was irrelevant and that Heard couldn’t show she had been prejudiced.
The judge threw out her application and said Depp’s court victory remained and the jury had made a “competent decision”.
She said: “The juror was vetted, sat for the entire jury, deliberated, and reached a verdict.
(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
“The only evidence before this court is that this juror and all jurors followed their oaths, the court’s instructions, and orders. This court is bound by the competent decision of the jury.”
Depp won a suit against Heard in a high-profile civil trial that started on April 11 and ended on June 1.
Depp sued for $50m (£42m) in Fairfax county after Heard wrote a 2018 op-ed in the Washington Post about domestic violence in which she referred to herself as “a public figure representing domestic abuse”.
(Image: POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
The article did not mention Depp, but his lawyers said several passages defamed him by implication by referring to highly publicised abuse allegations she made in 2016 as she filed for divorce.
The jury awarded $15m (£12.6m) to Depp and $2m (£1.7m) to Heard.
The $15m judgment was reduced to $10.35m (£8.7m) because Virginia law caps punitive damages at $350,000 (£295k)
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Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
