Johnny Depp kicked off his U.S. tour with Jeff Beck in Washington D.C. on Tuesday evening and had some special guests in the audience.
The singer, 59, took to the stage in front of a crowd which included his attorneys from his defamation trial, Camille Vasquez and Ben Chew.
Johnny was represented by Vasquez and Chew when he took Amber Heard to trial for defamation, over an op-ed she wrote accusing him of domestic abuse.
The widely-publicised trial was held just outside of D.C. in Fairfax County.
Johnny took to the stage with Jeff as his attorneys posed for snaps in the crowd, sporting VIP passes after helping the A-lister win his case.
The Pirates Of The Caribbean actor was typically effortless in his style, sporting a short-sleeved shirt and a grey waistcoat.
Johnny, who was awarded $10million in damages during the trial, was wearing dark-rinse jeans and boots as well as a flat cap and a selection of beaded necklaces.
Meanwhile Jeff, 78, was wearing a white shirt and a striped waistcoat and a pair of grey jeans with circular shades.
English rock guitarist was also showing off a spiky mop of hair.
The show comes after Amber was spotted for the first time since her headline-making defamation trial on holiday in Palma de Mallorca.
Amber recently changed lawyers yet again in her attempt to force two insurance firms to pick up the multimillion dollar bill for her libel payout.
The actress was ordered to pay her ex-husband millions in damages at the end of the explosive defamation trial in June.
She is currently represented by David L. Axelrod and Jay Ward Brown in her appeal of that verdict.
The actress has also recently hired Kirk Pasich on her legal team in an attempt to get multiple insurance companies to cover her legal bills, which may surpass $15million, according to Puck News.
Puck claims that Amber’s expenses soared over $8million before the Virginia trial even began. Amber’s team appears to want homeowner’s insurance to cover those bills.
The battle concerns Travelers Commercial Insurance Company and New York Marine General Insurance Company. Travelers initially sued New York Marine in July 2021 to gain reimbursement for half of what it spent on defending a client that turned out to be Amber.
Amber’s homeowners policy with Travelers covered ‘libel’ to the point of about $500,000, while New York Marine had issued her a general liability policy for $1million.
The crux of the suit was Travelers believing Amber had the right to pick her own lawyers, while New York Marine disagreed, believing the case was ‘fairly straight forward’. A judge agreed with New York Marine’s desire to use local, cheaper attorneys.
Travelers had doubts about New York Marine’s appointed lawyers Timothy McEvoy and Sean Patrick Roche, arguing they ‘piggy-backed’ on the work of Amber attorneys Roberta Kaplan and Elaine Charlson Bredehoft.
New York Marine, for their part, claimed their attorneys were frozen out by Kaplan and Bredehoft. They now want $621,693 paid back in exchange for their contribution to Amber’s defense fund because their lawyers were kept out of various legal proceedings.
The insurers are currently suing Amber to avoid contributing to the libel settlement that has the Aquaman star set to pay Depp about $10.35million using a California law preventing insurers from covering ‘willful acts’. Pasich is representing Amber to try and deal with this situation on her behalf.
Amber may be responsible for the entire judgement if it survives her appeal, as Travelers will try to avoid paying it if Depp could prove she made false statements.
At the end of the defamation trial, Depp, 59, was awarded $10million to $15million in compensatory damages and $5million in punitive damages.
The judge later capped the damages at the state’s maximum of $350,000 leaving Depp with a total of $8.35million.
Meanwhile, Amber won one of her three countersuit claims related to statements made by Depp’s lawyer suggesting the actress and her friends had trashed their apartment before calling the police.
The actress was awarded $2 million in compensatory damages out of the $100 million she sought.
A day after Amber’s team filed an appeal, Depp’s team did the same to overturn the couple million the actor owes to his ex-wife.
The Pirates of the Caribbean actor’s team said they filed an appeal to ensure ‘all information is considered by the court’ while they return to consider Amber’s appeal.
Before filing an appeal, Amber’s attorney asked the judge to throw out the decision and declare a mistrial. It was argued that one of the jurors on the case should not have been eligible to serve because his summons was intended for his father, who had the same name and lived at the same address.
Judge Penny Azcarate shot down the request claiming there was no ‘evidence of fraud or wrongdoing’ by the juror and that the jury’s verdict should stand.’
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