Kate Moss will testify for Johnny Depp at his defamation trial against his ex-wife Amber Heard, according to new reports.
Ms Moss, 48, is set to take the stand via video link on Wednesday, several outlets including the New York Post and People magazine reported on Monday as the trial entered its sixth and final week .
Ms Moss’ name came up in the courtroom earlier this month during Ms Heard’s testimony, when she described a time that Mr Depp allegedly “[swung] at” her sister while she had her back to a staircase.
Ms Heard said this reminded her of another incident during which she alleges Mr Depp pushed Ms Moss down stairs while they were dating in the 1990s.
The Aquaman actress had previously made the claim during Mr Depp’s 2020 trial against The Sun in the UK, per The Associated Press: “He was about to push her down the stairs and the moment before that happened, I remembered information I had heard that he pushed a former girlfriend — I believe it was Kate Moss — down the stairs.”
Ms Moss and Mr Depp dated for about four years beginning in 1994. Their relationship was often described by the press as tumultuous, particularly after an incident in 1994 when Mr Depp was arrested for criminal mischief after allegedly trashing a hotel room he shared with Ms Moss, People reported.
Ms Moss has never publicly responded to Ms Heard’s claim that Mr Depp pushed her down the stairs - which he denies. However, it’s very possible she will do so when she testifies this week.
After Ms Heard mentioned Ms Moss in her testimony as part of the US case, Mr Depp’s attorney Ben Chew was seen giving an apparent fist pump, prompting speculation that the mention of Ms Moss could benefit Mr Depp’s legal team in some way.
California entertainment lawyer Mitra Ahouraian told the Post: “that’s one mistake that [Ms Heard] made, was bringing up Kate Moss, which potentially opened the door to [Mr Depp’s team] bringing [Ms Moss] on as an impeachment witness”, adding that Ms Moss could be “saying ‘this never happened’”.
“Amber mentioned an ex of Johnny’s that clearly she felt was not supportive of him, which couldn’t be further from the truth”, a Depp source told the paper.
Ms Moss addressed her breakup from Mr Depp in a Vanity Fair interview in 2012, saying: “There’s nobody that’s ever really been able to take care of me. Johnny did for a bit. I believed what he said. Like if I said, ‘What do I do?’, he’d tell me. And that’s what I missed when I left. I really lost that gauge of somebody I could trust.”
Broderick Dunn, an attorney based in Virginia, previously told Fox5 that “since Heard brought up Depp’s alleged prior bad acts, she may have opened the door to her own”, per the website.
That speculation came to fruition on 17 May during cross-examination of Ms Heard, where she was asked about a 2009 arrest for domestic violence involving her then-partner Tasya van Ree.
Mr Depp’s lawsuit against Ms Heard alleges she defamed him in a December 2018 op-ed published in The Washington Post titled “I spoke up against sexual violence — and faced our culture’s wrath. That has to change”.
In her op-ed, Ms Heard wrote that “like many women, I had been harassed and sexually assaulted by the time I was of college age. But I kept quiet — I did not expect filing complaints to bring justice. And I didn’t see myself as a victim”.
“Then two years ago, I became a public figure representing domestic abuse, and I felt the full force of our culture’s wrath for women who speak out,” she added at the time.
While Mr Depp isn’t named in the piece, his legal team argues that it contains a “clear implication that Mr Depp is a domestic abuser”, which they say is “categorically and demonstrably false”. Mr Depp is seeking damages of “not less than $50m”.
Ms Heard has filed a $100m counterclaim against Mr Depp for nuisance and immunity from his allegations.
