Crime
Johnny Depp Testifies He Never Hit Ex-Wife Amber Heard
By Derrick Bangura
Actor Johnny Depp has testified in his $50m (£38m) defamation trial against ex-wife Amber Heard that he never struck her.
The lawsuit is over an opinion piece Ms Heard wrote for the Washington Post in which she called herself a victim of domestic violence. He denies any abuse.
Ms Heard has sued back, with a $100m counterclaim against Mr Depp.
The closely watched civil trial, which is taking place in Virginia, is now in its second week.
Ms Heard’s team has portrayed Mr Depp as an abusive partner prone to drug and alcohol binges.
Mr Depp’s team has presented Ms Heard’s claims of domestic violence as a “hoax” and a calculated strategy to ruin his reputation.
Speaking to the jury on Tuesday, Mr Depp said the truth was all that mattered to him now.
“I never struck Ms Heard in that way, nor have I struck any woman in my life,” he testified, adding that “her accusations sort of permeated the industry”.
“It’s been six years of trying times – so strange when one day you’re Cinderella, so to speak, and then in 0.6 seconds, you’re Quasimodo,” he said, describing how people’s attitudes towards him changed after Ms Heard’s op-ed was published.
The trial has focused so far on Mr Depp’s demeanour and whether he was ever verbally or physically abusive towards Ms Heard. Lawyers for Mr Depp have accused his ex-wife, an actress, of giving the “performance of her life” in her descriptions of alleged abuse.
Mr Depp began his testimony saying that Ms Heard’s claims are “not based in any species of the truth”.
His lawyer went on to ask him to describe his childhood in Kentucky, and the abuse that he suffered from his mother.
“I could see when she [his mother] was about to head into a situation where she was going to get riled up and someone was going to get it. And generally it was me,” he said.
Ms Heard is also expected to testify later in the trial.
The jury has heard evidence presented by the celebrity ex-couple’s former therapist, who described how Mr Depp and Ms Heard engaged in “mutual abuse”, as well as from medical workers who treated Mr Depp as he was detoxing himself from opiates.
On Monday, a nurse who was hired to treat Mr Depp’s drug addiction and attended the couple’s wedding testified that she witnessed Ms Heard “try to instigate” conflict with her former husband on several occasions.
She would sometimes pick fights with him while he was receiving medical treatment, said nurse Debbie Lloyd, who frequently travelled with Mr Depp.
Inside Johnny Depp and Amber Heard’s legal battle
On Tuesday, a sound engineer who has worked with Mr Depp on nearly all of his movies since the 1990s testified to having never witnessed the actor verbally or physically abuse his two children or their mother.
Keenan Wyatt, who is also a friend of Mr Depp, described how the actor wears an earpiece during filming to listen to music and occasionally have lines fed to him.
The trial is expected to last at least six weeks.
Ahead of the case, Ms Heard wrote on social media that she never identified Mr Depp by name in her 2018 op-ed.
“Rather, I wrote about the price women pay for speaking against men in power,” she said.
“I continue to pay that price, but hopefully when this case concludes, I can move on and so can Johnny”.
Crime
2 ladies docked for allegedly obtaining money by fraud
The police in Lagos have dragged two women, Mmesuma Ofunna, and Blessing Adimekwe, before an Ojo Magistrates’ Court in Lagos, over alleged obtaining money by false pretence.
Ofunna, 22, and Adimekwe, 25, were arraigned before the Magistrate, Mr L K J Layeni, on a four-count charge bordering on conspiracy, obtaining by false pretence, stealing and conduct likely to breach peace.
They each, however, pleaded not guilty to the charge.
The prosecutor, ASP Simon Uche, told the court that the defendants conspired with others now at large, to commit the offence on Oct. 26 at the Okokomaiko area of Ojo.
He alleged that they had obtained the sum of N70, 000 from one Faith Ahamefule, with a promise not to post her nude photo on social media.
The prosecutor alleged that the defendants later posted the nude photo of the nominal complainant on social media, knowing that their promise was false.
He alleged that they stole the N70, 0000, thereby conducting themselves in a manner likely to breach public peace.
The offence contravenes the provisions of sections 168(d), 287, 314, and 411 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State 2015.
The court granted the defendants bails in the sum of N500, 000 each, with two sureties each in like sum.
He adjourned the case until Jan. 8, 2025 for mention.
Crime
Mechanic jailed 15 months for pickpocketing passengers
A Jos Magistrates’ Court on Monday, sentenced a 26-year-old Mechanic, Sadiq Umar to 15 months imprisonment for pickpocketing from passengers.
The Magistrate, Shawomi Bokkos, summarily tried and sentenced the convict after he pleaded guilty to the charge.
Bokkos in his judgment, ordered the convict to pay an option of N100, 000 fine or spend one year in prison.
He also asked him to pay a compensation of N15, 000 or an additional three months in prison in default.
Earlier, the Prosecutor, Insp Ijuptil Thiawur, told the court that the case was reported on Nov.16, at the “A” Division Police station by Moses Pam, Alexander Bakshak and Simon Justice the complaints.
Thiawur said that the convict attempted to steal from them before he was caught in the act and when the driver stopped the vehicle to search him he fled but was caught.
The Police said that the offence contravened the Plateau Penal Code Law.
Crime
Police detain 2 suspected fraudsters, reject N66m bribe in Lagos
The Zone-2 Police Command in Lagos says it has detained two suspected international fraudsters that allegedly specialised in forging foreign certificates in Lagos and Ghana.
The AIG in charge of the zone, Adegoke Fayaode, confirmed this to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Monday.
Fayoade said that the suspects allegedly offered N66m to the operatives with a view to free them but the offer was turned down.
NAN reports that the same zone operatives rejected a N174m bribe offered by a suspect in November to set him free.
Fayoade said that the suspects simply identified as Elvis, 23 and Kelly, 24, allegedly specialised in forging certificates of different nations and African Universities and defrauding their unsuspecting victims on the internet.
He said that the suspects have succeeded in acquiring exotic cars and erecting mansions in different parts of the country with the proceeds of their loot.
The AIG pointed out that luck ran out of the suspects after detectives at the Anti-Corruption Unit of the Zone received credible information from Nigerians in diaspora concerning some group of boys that specialised in forging foreign certificates.
According to him, on getting the information, he detailed the anti-corruption unit to investigate it and arrest the suspects without delay.
Fayoade said that based on his directives, the detectives stormed Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos waiting for the arrival of the suspects, whom they trailed to a five star hotel at Osapa-London in Lekki Area.
He said that the operatives arrested the suspects at a bus stop while they were about to escape secretly from the hotel, after monitoring their activities.
“Searching their luggage, one certificate of Blue Crest College, Ghana, belonging to Elvis and a student identity card of Academic City College belonging to Kelly were recovered.
“Further search revealed a transcript of an academic record from Blue Crest University belonging to Elvis.
“A letter of English proficiency from the said college and a letter of recommendation from the same Blue Crest College were recovered,” he said.
The AIG said that the suspects made useful statements to the police and confessed that they never got any admission into the school, stressing that they only procured the degree certificates through the help of a female Nigerian resident in Ghana.
“The suspects further confessed that the major aim of doing that is to enable them to get Ghana resident permit, which they got.
“The resident permit is showing them also as a student of Academic City University and that none of them has ever been admitted in the school.
“They claimed they paid a total of 26,000 Ghana Cedis for all the documents procured.
“They confessed that they procured all the documents to evade arrest in Ghana since they don’t have any means of livelihood.
Whenever police intercepted them, they showed their passports that they were students in Ghana.”
Fayoade said that the suspects were also allegedly involved in online romance scam, provision of foreign bank accounts for fraudulent transactions on the internet through what they call ‘Facebook bombing’.
He said the suspects presented themselves as an American soldier by name Captain Donald Rowe, serving in Syria, whom they impersonated on Instagram, using his name to defraud innocent persons.
The AIG said that while detectives were making frantic efforts to get more credible information from the suspects, they started negotiating to bribe the operatives for them to be set free.
“I directed my men to play along and recover the money as an exhibit. Subsequently, the detectives played along and the suspects paid them a sum of N66m, which they collected and kept as an exhibit.
“The Nigeria Police authorities have written to the Ghana embassy to get more information about the result and their suspected partners in Ghana said to be spearheading the fraud.
Fayoade said that they had also spread their dragnets through the International Police, Interpol, to round up their foreign accomplices.
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