One of Johnny Depp’s witnesses had their testimony tossed out the window after about 30 minutes on the stand Thursday.
Depp’s team called Georgina “Gina” Deuters to the stand during his defamation trial against Amber Heard. Deuters is a longtime friend of the actor and also the wife of Stephen Deuters, one of Depp’s employees for 18 years.
Depp is seeking $50 million in damages after Heard claimed she was a survivor of domestic abuse in an op-ed in the Washington Post in 2018. While she didn’t name Depp in the piece, his lawyers argue it was implied to be about him and negatively affected his career. She countersued Depp for $100 million.
During her testimony, Deuters was first asked whether she saw Depp ever drink or use drugs throughout their friendship. She said she had and also partook in drug use with him.
“I’ve seen him smoke weed and occasionally cocaine,” she said, before saying the coke was “usually” reserved for “kind of a celebratory event, like after a gig or party or something like that.” She said that in the 18 years they’d known each other, she’d seen him use it 20 times, adding that it wasn’t a “regular thing” but “sporadic.”
“I quite honestly can’t gauge much difference in his demeanor,” she said of how he behaved on cocaine. “This stuff tends to make the average person a bit chattier and maybe stays up a bit longer than they should, but nothing out of the ordinary.”
She also said it was “kind of annoying” that Depp could hold his liquor “very well” and became “more jovial” when he drank. “I’ve honestly never seen him drunk, drunk,” she said, before adding that he never appeared angry or violent when drinking or on drugs.
She spoke a bit about Depp and Heard’s interactions early on in their relationship, saying Amber was a bit standoffish with her and her husband at first. She said Heard also seemed “a bit frustrated that I don’t think Johnny was ready to go public with the relationship.”
Deuters was asked a bit about makeup as well, saying she didn’t believe Heard wore it that often. “She’s naturally beautiful. I remember thinking how gorgeous her skin was and how pretty she was,” she said, before saying she considered herself to be “quite the makeup expert” and though she was “pretty good at telling if someone’s wearing foundation or concealer.”
She was also specifically asked about something called “artica cream,” just one of the many times the name of “arnica cream” has been butchered so far in this trial. Arnica cream is used to reduce bruising. Deuters admitted she used it, pointed out that it’s transparent and said bruises are still visible after using.
Deuters also recalled a time Amber allegedly got “angry” at Depp for sneaking secret sips of a drink — possibly champagne — during the press tour for “The Lone Ranger.” She said Depp “got a telling off … it was a bit like telling off a child.”
She then spoke about attending the couple’s 2015 wedding, calling it “predominately an Amber event, in the sense that a large percentage of the guests were her friends and family.” She added “a lot of his friends and family couldn’t make it because it seemed to happen so quickly. Her and her friends seemed to be having a wonderful time.”
Deuters also claimed Amber and one of her friends supplied her with her “first taste of MDMA,” saying “all” Heard’s friends were on it throughout the celebrations. “It was like a party atmosphere,” she added.
Throughout all this, some commotion started between the lawyers on Heard’s team, after she slipped one of them a Post-It note. They all started looking at the same phone, before asking to approach the judge. The audio cut out at that point, as they showed the judge what was on the device.
The judge then asked Deuters whether she had been watching the trial so far. “I’ve seen clips of it online, yeah,” she said, before confirming she had also seen clips of other witness testimonies, a huge no-no. With that, she was excused and court went into recess. When they returned, the judge addressed the jury.
“The court is striking the testimony of Georgina ‘Gina’ Deuters from the record in its entirety from the record,” she told them. “Therefore the court further instructs you, the jury, to disregard her testimony in its entirety.”
It’s unclear how Heard’s team appeared to know Deuters had been watching the trial.
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