If you have even a small amount of social media on your phone, you have heard about the defamation trial between actors Johnny Depp and Amber Heard. And if you haven’t, let’s dive a little deeper into what happened.

A Virginia jury ordered Amber Heard to pay her ex-husband Johnny Depp $15 million in damages in a defamation case. Depp was also ordered to pay Heard $2 million in damages. Depp sued his ex-wife for defamation in 2019 after she published a piece about her experiences as a domestic abuse survivor. Ruth Glenn of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence joined John Yang to discuss this case professionally.

Amber Heard told the jury that Mr. Depp was a “dangerous and unstable man” and would routinely hit her when he was intoxicated.

Mr. Depp refused these claims, and had vital evidence that Ms. Heard was the true abuser. He showed the jury over 37 photos of when she severed his finger, and how the relationship was toxic as a whole.

Early in the trial, Ms. Heard has the jury in her grasp. She used tears, and many photos of herself with a bruised eye to sway the audience.

Johnny Depp believed all was lost until he brought in another lawyer, named Camille Vaquez. She showed unedited photos to the jury of exact dates and times that Ms. Heard sworn to have been badly bruised by Mr. Depp. But alas, her face was not even slightly altered. After speaking to many other people in the trial, it was found that these bruises she said to be the act of violence, were just those of cosmetic surgery.

But if this wasn’t enough, Ms. Heard’s own lawyers had said “we’re trying. We truly are.” To find evidence to backup Ms. Heard.

Now, for the news you’ve all been waiting for. What truly was the verdict?

“It was like the weight of the world had been taken off his shoulders, and I feel that finally, after six years, he has gotten his life back,” attorney Benjamin Chew told “Good Morning America” co-anchor George Stephanopoulos.

Chew and fellow Depp lawyer Camille Vasquez appeared Wednesday on both GMA and NBC’s “Today.” Vasquez added on GMA that “the key to victory was focusing on the facts and the evidence and Johnny’s opportunity to speak the truth for the first time.” She said the outcome was “six years in the making.”

A Fairfax County Circuit Court jury found on June 1 that Heard defamed Depp with a 2018 Washington Post op-ed in which she described herself as a public figure representing domestic abuse. Heard did not name Depp in the article. Depp, who sued Heard for $50 million, was awarded 15 million (though he will receive $10.35 million, as Virginia law limits punitive damages to $350,000). Heard received $2 million after the jury ruled in favor of a countersuit claim that former Depp lawyer Adam Waldman defamed her.

What does this mean in normal words? Johnny Depp won the case. The jury came to the conclusion that neither party was 100% innocent so both must be awarded some form of money. I think the biggest take away of this trial is that it brought light to men who have victims to abuse. That women are also capable of this evil. So, how will you stop this from happening?