Months after their marriage ended in 2016, in a text message to his former agent, Johnny Depp promised he would bring "total global humiliation" to Amber Heard.
He fulfilled that promise, Heard said in a Today show interview with Savannah Guthrie, part of which aired Wednesday.
"I’m not a 'good victim,' I get it. I’m not a likable victim. I’m not a perfect victim," Heard said. "But when I testified, I asked the jury to just see me as human and to hear his own words, which is a promise to do this. It feels as though he has."
Guthrie has previously disclosed that her husband had served as a consultant for Depp's legal team. The interview with Heard comes after she lost a defamation case brought by Depp, which concluded earlier this month following a brutal six-week trial. Depp sued Heard for writing an op-ed — which did not name him — about having been a victim of domestic abuse. Throughout the trial, she testified that Depp had abused her, at times slapping and sexually assaulting her. Depp denied the allegations, saying he "never struck" her, and described his texts about burning Heard's body and "fuck[ing] her burnt corpse" as "just irreverent and abstract humor."
In the end, Depp won $10.35 million after the jury found Heard's op-ed constituted libel. Additionally, the jury found Heard had been defamed by Depp's lawyer calling her allegations a hoax, and she was awarded $2 million.
The case, which was livestreamed, largely played out on social media. An overwhelming majority sided with Depp and directed hatred toward Heard, with many mocking her testimony. The jury was not sequestered, provoking questions from Heard and her legal team about whether jurors were influenced by the one-sided online campaign, a claim that Depp's lawyers have denied.
Watch all of part two of @SavannahGuthrie's exclusive interview with Amber Heard, in which Heard discusses her future, fears about new defamation lawsuits and whether she still “has love” for Johnny Depp:
In her Today show interview, Heard said she "took for granted what I assumed was my right to speak" in writing her op-ed. She said that she now worries that continuing to speak about the trial and her allegations against Depp could put her at risk of facing more lawsuits brought by her ex-husband.
"I’m scared that no matter what I do, no matter what I say or how I say it, every step that I take will present another opportunity for this sort of silencing," she said. "Which is what I guess a defamation lawsuit is meant to do — it’s meant to take your voice."
Heard hit back against Depp's team for claiming her abuse allegations were nothing more than lies. The trial was "meant to cast aspersions on who I am as a human, my credibility, to call me a liar in every way you can," she said.
She also responded to the suggestion that bruises seen on her face in photos presented during the trial were fake.
"Again, it’s that thing — if you have bruising, if you have injuries, it’s fake," she said. "If you don’t have any, then you weren’t injured."
"This was a hoax, according to [Depp's] team. Why didn’t I cooperate with the police?" she said. "As I’ve testified before and I will stand by until my dying day, I didn’t want to cooperate with them. I didn’t want this to be out, I didn’t want this to be known. I didn’t want to cooperate with them because I didn’t want … to get him in trouble."
Heard said she still has love for Depp and does not wish ill on him.
"I love him. I loved him with all my heart," she said. "And I tried the best I could to make a deeply broken relationship work. And I couldn’t."
"I have no bad feelings or ill will towards him at all," she continued. "I know that might be hard to understand — or it might be really easy to understand. If you’ve just ever loved anyone, it should be easy."