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Amber Heard ditched her original PR team and hired a new one just days before the actress is set to take the stand in Johnny Depp’s ongoing defamation trial, Fox News Digital can confirm.
Heard has hired Shane Communications after ending her contract with Precision Strategies.
The actress is expected to take the stand Wednesday and CEO David Shane along with Shane Communications is now handling all of Heard’s communications and media strategy, Fox News Digital has learned.
Depp sued Heard for $50 million over a 2018 op-ed the “Aquaman” actress wrote in the Washington Post. In the op-ed, Heard claimed she was a victim of domestic violence.
Johnny Depp sued Amber Heard for defamation in Fairfax County Circuit Court after she wrote an op-ed piece in the Washington Post in 2018 referring to herself as a “public figure representing domestic abuse.”
(Michael Reynolds/Pool Photo via AP)
Although she never mentioned Depp by name, the “Pirates of the Caribbean” actor has claimed the inclusion of the dates relating to the alleged abuse led readers to believe that he was the accused.
JOHNNY DEPP VS. AMBER HEARD: WHAT WILL THE ‘AQUAMAN’ ACTRESS SAY ON THE STAND?
Heard countersued for $100 million and claimed Depp and his lawyers put together a smear campaign with the goal of destroying her reputation.
A brand and crisis management expert told Fox News that the switch feels like an “unforced error” ahead of Heard’s expected testimony.
“For several weeks, Depp’s team presented his side of the story, including audio tapes of Heard saying she hit him, a psychologist testifying that she has borderline personality disorder and that she literally s— the bed,” the expert said.
“You’ve either got to have exceptionally thin skin or not understand how the media works to think anyone could spin their way to positive headlines with these kinds of attacks happening not just in the courtroom, but on national TV, for the last several weeks,” the expert continued. “It’s certainly possible things could move more in her favor once the defense starts presenting its case, but it feels like an unforced error to switch PR teams right before that begins.”
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Amber Heard has countersued Johnny Depp for $100 million alleging that he and his lawyers put together a smear campaign to destroy her reputation.
(Evelyn Hockstein/Pool via AP)
The decision for Heard to hire a new PR team was reportedly made in order to fix the “bad headlines.”
“She doesn’t like bad headlines,” a source told the New York Post.
Another insider told the outlet that the actress is “frustrated with her story not being told effectively.”
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Johnny Depp and Amber Heard at premiere of “Black Mass” in 2015.
(Reuters/Fred Thornhill TPX)
Heard allegedly did not want the trial televised, but Depp pushed for it and in the end the decision was made for it to be livestreamed.
Fox News’ Rebecca Rosenberg contributed to this report.
