Johnny Depp Plea Against "Wife Beater" Ruling Gets Rejected By UK Court

Johnny Depp "wife beater" appeal: Johnny Depp's plea to appeal against the "wife beater" ruling was refused by a British Court.

The court had earlier ruled that Depp assaulted his ex-wife Amber Heard. While refusing the appeal against the earlier judgment, the court said that Depp appeal had "no real prospect of success."

The judge said that Depp cannot challenge the High Court's judgement and rejected the libel lawsuit against the publishers of The Sun newspaper which carried an article calling Depp a "wife beater".

James Dingemans and Nicholas Underhill were the judges who gave rejected Depp's appeal and they said that the earlier judgement by the High Court was " full and fair" and that the ruling has "not been shown even arguably to be vitiated by any error of approach or mistake of law.”

The judges said,  “the appeal has no real prospect of success and that there is no other compelling reason for it to be heard.”

What was the judgement given by the High Court?

In November last, High Court judge Andrew Nicol had ruled that the allegations against Johnny Depp made in an April 2018 article were "substantially true". By which the judge gave his judgement that Depp did assault Amber Heard on many occasions and made her fear for her life three times.

Depp' lawyer had argued that he did not get a fair hearing and accused Heard of being an unreliable witness. Depp's counsel argued that because according to them Heard did not keep her promise to donate $7 million dollar worth of divorce money to charity. But the appeal court judge brushed it aside called it "pure speculation" and in their view, " very unlikely"

Johnny Depp and Amber Heard divorce row

The couple after meeting in 2011 got married in February 2015 in Los Angeles. Model and actor Amber Heard filed for divorce the next year and later asked for a restraining order against Depp as she accused him of domestic violence. The divorce was finalised by the court in 2017. During the trials of their divorce, Depp and Heard both accused each other of being violent. Depp later admitted to having drug problems but he denied the abuse allegations made by Heard. He said that he was "not a violent person, especially with women."

The Sun newspaper later ran an article naming Depp as a "wife beater". When Depp contesting against the article in court, the publishers of the newspaper argued that the said article was "a victory for the freedom of the press and for victims of domestic violence everywhere." Depp did not feel the same way about the article as he claimed that it causes "serious harm" to his reputation and brought him "significant distress and embarrassment".