Amber Heard has reportedly paid less than half of her the $3.5 million pledged donation to the American Civil Liberties Union.
Terence Dougherty, the ACLU’s COO, made the claim in a pre-recorded deposition that was played Thursday during Johnny Depp’s defamation trial against Heard. The actor is suing his ex-wife for $50 million, claiming her abuse allegations have caused severe damage to his reputation and career.
The former couple finalized their split in 2017, after reaching a divorce settlement in which Depp paid the 36-year-old actress $7 million. As part of the deal, Heard promised to donate the money to charity; half of it going to the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, and the other half to the ACLU. However, Dougherty claims Heard has only paid $1.3 million to the organization—and a large portion of that sum seemingly came from other parties, including Heard’s ex-boyfriend Elon Musk.
Dougherty testified the ACLU received $350,000 directly from Heard in 2016. It also received a $100,000 check from Depp on Heard’s behalf, as well as $350,000 from a donor-advised fund at Fidelity and $500,000 from a donor-advised fund at Vanguard. As pointed out by Insider, the ACLU COO believes the latter payment came from a fund set up by Musk, who started dating Heard after she split from Depp in 2016.
The executive told the court he couldn’t confirm that Musk had donated the $500,000 on Heard’s behalf, but pointed to an email Musk had sent to ACLU executive director Anthony Romero. In the message, Musk told Romero that Heard would pay the $3.5 million over a 10-year period. However, Dougherty said the organization stopped receiving payments in 2019, when they “learned that she was having financial difficulties.”
Dougherty also told the court Heard never signed a pledge form the ACLU had prepared for her. He also claimed the actress told the organization not to issue a press release about her pledged donation.
