Amber Heard Fires PR Team Days Before Testimony as Public Sides With Johnny Depp Throughout Bombshell Trial

Jonathan Ernst Pool/Getty Images

Amber Heard has fired her public relations team days before taking the stand during her ex-husband Johnny Depp’s defamation trial, according to NBC News. 

Heard dropped her crisis management team at Precision Strategies, co-founded by former President Barack Obama’s deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter, as the public has clearly sided with Depp throughout the trial.

The actress has since acquired the services of Shane Communications, a move confirmed to NBC News by the firm’s CEO David Shane.

Depp has largely controlled the narrative as he took the stand on April 19 and testified until the 25th, yet Heard is expected to testify on Wednesday.

While NBC confirmed the news, the New York Post first reported on Heard’s PR switch up, with a source telling the outlet that she has been “frustrated with her story not being told effectively.”

“She doesn’t like bad headlines,” the source added.

According to the Post, Shane Communications has worked against Depp before, as they helped represent his former business managers, The Management Group, as the company alleged Depp needed therapy for his “compulsive spending” habit.

Depp is currently suing Heard for $50 million, claiming that she defamed him in an op-ed she wrote for the Washington Post in 2018. Although Heard never named Depp in the column, she heavily implied that Depp abused her throughout their marriage.

Heard has since filed a $100 million countersuit accusing Depp of orchestrating a “smear campaign” against her via his lawsuit.

Depp had previously lost a libel case against the publisher of Britain’s The Sun in 2020. The British High Court ruled that the claim Depp was a “wife-beater” was “substantially true.”