Defamation spotlight: Depp lawsuit continues, Rittenhouse considers action

Johnny Depp’s defamation lawsuit against Amber Heard has started in Virginia. Depp sued Heard in March 2019, alleging a column Heard wrote in The Washington Post about domestic violence was defamatory.

The actor has asked for $50 million in damages. Heard has filed a $100 million countersuit.

In the past three years, viral videos and cases garnering national attention have grown to involve defamation claims.

A teen who alleged that news coverage of his encounter with a Native American activist on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in 2019 was defamatory settled lawsuits with CNN and The Washington Post in 2020. The terms of the settlements were not disclosed.

Kyle Rittenhouse, who was recently cleared of all charges in the trial over killing two people in Kenosha, Wisconsin, has threatened to sue President Joe Biden, claiming defamation of character.

“Me and my team have decided to launch The Media Accountability Project as a tool to help fundraise and hold the media accountable for the lies they said and deal with them in court,” Rittenhouse told Tucker Carlson in February. “We’re going to hold everybody who lied about me accountable … We’re going to handle them in a courtroom.”

Experts have questioned if Rittenhouse could sue President Biden over allegations he defamed his character following his homicide arrest.

“A defamation case is unlikely to succeed here against any defendant,” Barbara McQuade, a University of Michigan law professor and former U.S. attorney in Detroit, told Newsweek in 2021. “By inserting himself into the civil unrest in Kenosha, Rittenhouse voluntarily became a limited purpose public figure, which subjects defamation claims against him to the actual malice standard.”

The Supreme Court established the actual malice standard in public figure defamation actions in 1964. A public figure plaintiff must prove that the publisher published the statement with knowledge of its falsity or with reckless disregard for the truth of the statement.

Defamation is broken down into two categories: libel or slander. Libel is written defamation and slander is verbal defamation.