What Will be the Johnny Depp Vs Amber Heard Verdict? And Who’s Camille Vasquez?
The trial the world watched and gave its verdict
It’s the court case of the decade! In fact, I can’t think of a case that’s had this much public attention since the O.J. trial — where a sports star who committed double murder was found innocent! A miscarriage of justice that lives on in the collective consciousness to this day.
The Johnny Depp Vs Amber Heard trial had everything needed to keep us hooked: drama, romance, lies, glamour, celebrity — and human-fecal matter. Bless those Teacup Yorkies! It’s become its own cottage industry for YouTubers, with millions of people from around the world watching live stream commentary on the legal proceedings while screaming “liar!” at the screen.
When the abuse allegations were first brought against Johnny Depp, I, along with most others, thought, “not another celeb that’s been abusing women.” I was taken in by the British-tabloid headlines (I know, pretty stupid.) and condemned Depp and supported Amber Heard.
My knowledge of Amber Heard was pretty scant and went something along the lines of, “She’s the pretty woman I watched in All The Boys Love Mandy Lane.” Actually, it was more like, “She’s the prettiest woman I’ve ever seen” [mouth agape and eyes wide open]. There is no getting away from the fact, as I wrote in another piece, that she has “a face nature sculpted to the exact proportions that make a marionette of any man who sees [her].” Her high cheekbones, retroussé nose, petite features, and full lips are all perfectly set to the golden mean on an immaculate complexion. She has the metabolism of a baby gazelle and the grace of an Olympian dressage winner. But you quickly become blind to beauty when you glimpse the ugly that resides beneath. The ugly that has been lying in wait, hidden by a perfect smile and a crafted innocence.
But what is the ugly that made Amber Heard despised the world over?
The lies. The deception and failure to own her actions while asking, “Magic mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest one of all?”, made Amber Heard the pantomime villain, the Evil Queen. It’s no secret Johnny Depp was a drug-addled drunk, a libertine, who has lived a debauched life with little consequence (before meeting Amber Heard, that is). He wears his excess openly for all to see. But the public respect someone who owns their faults and failures. It builds trust and shows authenticity. So we forgave Johnny Depp and quietly told him under our breath, “do better!” And this is the key difference between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard: Johnny Depp understands and acknowledges his mistakes — Amber doesn’t (or can’t?).
Amber Heard misjudged the public. She thought they could be lied to and easily fooled. But we are not so easily tricked. And we hate it when we are lied to. We can tolerate a certain level of bad behavior, providing that person has their road to Damascus moment, a mea culpa, and is genuinely contrite for what they have done. In fact, we champion the story of the villain turned good. But we cannot tolerate the villain playing the victim. The villain that can see no wrong in the harm they have done.
I sincerely hope Johnny Depp and Amber Heard take stock of the mess they’ve entertained us with over the past six weeks; that they learn from all their ugliness laid bare for the world to see. I have my doubts, though, with Amber Heard. There’s a superciliousness that comes across in her self-assured belief she could fool us all; that we are somehow intellectually deficient to her and there for the taking. If you object to this, I urge you to (re)watch Camille Vasquez in her redirect of Miss Heard. In particular, pay close attention to the timeline of the restraining order Miss Heard sought, the TMZ tip-off, and when Mr. Depp told Miss Heard he wanted a divorce.
The timeline: Johnny Depp breaks up with Amber Heard and tells her he wants a divorce; Amber Heard, determined to be the petitioner and never the respondent, immediately files for divorce before Johnny Depp and applies for a restraining order against him (the man who hadn’t seen her for a month and had already told her he wants a divorce.) This is far from the evidence needed to make a case against Amber Heard, but it shows the beginning of a plan that was hatched, and how she thought the public would be deceived. It set things up for an Op-ed that was perfectly timed to coincide with the release of a major film she stared in. And it’s this level of calculated deviousness that does not sit well with the public.
But with all that said, sending Miss Heard death threats and trolling her online isn’t going to help her begin the process of understanding her behavior and for rehabilitation. It will either break her or harden her to the world — with neither helping her become a better person nor giving her a chance of redemption. We need to recalibrate our reaction to the crimes we believe she committed — she’s not a murderer or rapist, lest we forget! But she did blame those cute Teacup Yorkies, though…
The trial was an ugly spectacle we gleefully scrutinized and moralized over, picking sides and rooting for our team to win. But in its better moments it did, however, give us our own Atticus Finch for the ages — but more acerbic and a lot easier on the eye — Camille Vasquez. Miss Heard met her match (and then some) in Camille Vasquez. She was sharp, confident, and in control. We watched her in awe and with respect, relieved we were not on the receiving end of one of her cross-examinations. And we collectively swooned when she dashed to say goodbye to Johnny Depp and swooned again at the embrace she was given by Mr. Depp after closing arguments. We scripted in our heads the story of them both, their romance, their holidays in Cape Cod, and what their children would look like.
This was short-lived, however. We learned Camille Vasquez is already happily in a relationship with a British guy — sadly, not me — who’s in real estate. This is as much as we know about Camille Vasquez, a lady who abstains from social media and keeps her private life… well… private.
The legal standard for Mr. Depp to win his case is a steep one to meet. The jury’s verdict has a number of possible outcomes, ranging from both parties being found guilty to an outright winner, where one party is guilty of defaming the other. But perhaps the jury’s verdict is not so important… and what really matters is the truth be told for the world to decide. And through the years of lies and deception that followed the fallout of this toxic relationship, we find as Seneca once said, “Time discovers the truth.”
