The court reporter for the Johnny Depp defamation case against Amber Heard said jurors forced to sit for hours of video depositions would often doze off.
Judy Bellinger has revealed what she observed about the jury during the blockbuster libel battle over the past few weeks.
But it came as she was accused of bias after a photo emerged of her laughing with the Pirates actor after testimony ended.
After less than three days of deliberation, the jury ruled in favor of Depp’s three defamation allegations against Heard, finding that she had falsely accused him of domestic violence.
The lightning-fast verdict came at the end of the six-week trial that was the OJ Simpson case of Generation Z: a show cut and replayed on ICT Tac in clips viewed tens of millions of times.
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In an interview, court reporter Judy Bellinger spoke about what she observed about the jurors in the Johnny Depp v Amber Heard trial.
Bellinger, who transcribed the lengthy trial, said the jury listened ‘very carefully’ throughout the trial (pictured smiling at Depp)
Amber Heard supporters say footage of Bellinger hugging Depp is proof she’s biased
It was the second time the former husband and wife have faced each other in court: Depp lost a defamation case against a British newspaper at the High Court in London in 2020, where a judge ruled he was ‘substantially true’ that he was a wife-beater.
Bellinger, a stenographer with private company Planet Depos who transcribed the lengthy trial, told Law and Crime that the jury listened “very carefully” throughout the trial.
Bellinger said when the jury was chosen it was known that some would end up being alternates and not decide the verdict and that she knew who the names of the alternates were all along.
But she said she couldn’t remember the alternates’ numbers and throughout the six-week trial one juror in particular stood out to her as the ‘top juror’ because of his attentiveness.
In the end, this juror ended up being one of the alternatives chosen at the start of the trial.
“Unfortunately the only substitute that was there was probably the one who listened the most,” Bellinger said. “I watched her facial expressions, she was deep into every word that was said and I thought she would have made a great juror and she couldn’t see it all the way.”
Both Depp and Heard testified for four days each, including forensic cross-examination by opposition attorneys.
Johnny Depp has spoken out in his blockbuster $100 million defamation lawsuit against his ex-wife Amber Heard
Over six weeks in court in Fairfax, Virginia, Depp called 38 witnesses while Heard called 24. Depp and Heard met on the set of the 2011 film The Rum Diary, appearing on the red carpet together for his premiered in London in 2011.
Bellinger recalled the juror’s exasperated reaction to finding out she was a substitute and said she felt the same way.
‘I was like oh man! she was going to be the best juror! she says.
Bellinger said the alternate juror also stood out because unlike the others, she never fell asleep.
“There were a few jurors dozing around,” Bellinger said. “She never dozed off”
She said jurors in both rows sometimes disappeared, mimicking jurors with their hands holding their heads and their eyes closing as they sat for hours of depositions.
“It was difficult because there were a lot of video depositions. They would just sit there and all of a sudden I would see their heads drop off,” she said.
His interview came after a video emerged of Bellinger hugging Depp on the final day of the trial.
Bellinger denied allegations that she “partyed” with Depp and his legal team and told Law and Crime that Depp asked to meet her after she arranged to retrieve her equipment to transcribe the case with actor Ben Chew’s attorney.
She said she ended up meeting at the hotel where Depp’s team was staying where she met Depp in a hospitality room after the end of the trial.
“Johnny was in there, and so I had to go over there and get my gear, and I saw him, and they said ‘he really wants to meet you,'” Bellinger said. “I was probably in there less than 10 minutes, and he just hugged me and thanked me again. And I hugged a few other people there, and I got my gear and I went out, I left, and I went home.
Amber Heard supporters said footage of Bellinger hugging Depp was proof she was biased.
There are also photos of Bellinger smiling at Depp in court that have been widely shared.
Both Depp and Heard testified for four days each, including forensic cross-examination by opposition attorneys.
The jury saw dozens of texts, photos, videos, medical records and even pages of the former couple’s “Love Journal” that they wrote by hand.
The libel case was so complicated that the verdict sheet had 42 questions for the jury to answer before returning the verdict: 24 questions for Depp’s allegations and 18 for Heard’s counterclaim.
The jury ultimately found in favor of Depp’s three libel claims against Heard and were awarded $15 million – $10 million in compensation and $5 million in punitive damages.
Heard won only one of her three counterclaims, which involved statements made by Depp’s lawyer suggesting she and friends ransacked their apartment before calling the police.
She was awarded $2 million in compensatory damages of the $100 million she sought in her countersuit against her ex-husband and was awarded no dollars in punitive damages.
The judge then reduced Depp’s $5 million punitive damages award to the maximum of $350,000 in Virginia, reducing Depp’s total to $10,350,000 – minus the $2 million he has was ordered to pay Heard.
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