Kate Moss is set to testify in the ongoing defamation trial between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard.
A source close to the actor Johny Depp, 58, confirms that the supermodel, 48, will speak to the via video link on Wednesday.
The model Kate Moss, who is Depp’s ex, was referenced by Heard, 36, earlier this month during the stand, while discussing an alleged altercation between Depp and Whitney Henriquez.
The Aquaman 2 actress said Henriquez was near a staircase “in the line of fire … trying to get Johnny to stop,” which reminded her of a rumored incident between Moss and Depp.
“[Whitney’s] back was to the staircase, and Johnny swings at her,” Heard testified. “I don’t hesitate, I don’t wait — I just, in my head, instantly think of Kate Moss and stairs.”
“And I swung at him,” Heard continued of the alleged March 2015 incident between herself, Henriquez and Depp.
In all of my relationship to date with Johnny, I hadn’t landed a blow,” she said. “And I, for the first time, hit him — like, actually hit him. Square in the face.”
Heard added, “He didn’t push my sister down the stairs.” (Henriquez, 34, testified later that Depp once hit her and then “repeatedly” struck Heard, who allegedly defended Henriquez in the incident.)
As soon as Amber Heard mentions Moss’s name during her testimony Depp’s lawyers were spotted fist-pumping, presumably because it gave them the opportunity to bring in the model as an impeachment witness to dispel the rumored incident.
Heard first made the Moss staircase allegation during her testimony at Depp’s U.K. defamation trial in 2020
“I remembered information I had heard [that] he pushed a former girlfriend — I believe it was Kate Moss — down the stairs,” Heard previously testified while describing the same fight involving her sister and Depp. “I had heard this rumor from two people and it was fresh in my mind.”
Benjamin Chew, one of Depp’s lawyers, appeared animated when Heard mentioned Moss in her testimony. A source close to Depp previously told Insider that Heard’s mention of Moss was among an “embarrassment of riches” for Depp’s lawyers to cross-examine her and present their rebuttal.
It’s not clear whether Heard’s attorneys will object to Moss being called as a witness. Before the trial began the parties fought over which witnesses would be permitted to testify, and that Heard’s passing mention of Moss may not meet the legal thresholds to call her as a witness.
Other former partners of Depp, including Vanessa Paradis and Winona Ryder, came out publicly to support him. But Ellen Barkin, who dated Depp in 1994, testified in a deposition on Heard’s behalf that Depp had a “jealous” and “controlling” streak and once threw a wine bottle in her direction.
The blockbuster trial is scheduled to wrap up with closing arguments on Friday before jurors begin deliberating.