Johnny Depp to Donate $1 Million From Defamation Case Settlement to Charity

Johnny Depp will be donating a portion of his settlement in his defamation case with Amber Heard to five separate charities

Make-A-Film Foundation, The Painted Turtle, Red Feather, Tetiaroa Society and Amazonia Fund Alliance are the five charities that will receive donations of $200,000 each, totaling $1 million, a source close to Depp confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter.

THR reached out to reps for Heard for comment.

The Amazonia Fund Alliance is a collection of nonprofits and sustainability-driven companies that focus on protecting, supporting and preserving Indigenous communities of the Amazon, while Red Feather works to develop and implement housing solutions for American Indigenous communities. Make-A-Film Foundation partners with noted Hollywood talent to grant wishes to kids with serious or life-threatening medical conditions and has previously worked with Depp on a short film.

The other organizations also have Hollywood connections, with The Painted Turtle — a free-of-charge summer camp near Lake Elizabeth in California for children with life-threatening and chronic illnesses — being co-founded by Paul Newman, and the natural and cultural conservation efforts of Tetiaroa Society serving the tiny Marlon Brando-leased atoll near Tahiti.

The donation is part of a larger settlement agreement between Heard and Depp that was announced last December, which awarded Depp $10 million and Heard $2 million.

“We are pleased to formally close the door on this painful chapter for Mr. Depp, who made clear throughout this process that his priority was about bringing the truth to light,” Depp’s attorneys, Benjamin Chew and Camille Vasquez, said in a statement to THR. 

In an Instagram statement, Heard said she made the decision to settle to avoid yet another “arduous and expensive legal process” in which she was “unable to protect me and my right to free speech.” She also said she had exhausted “almost all my resources in advance of and during a trial.”

“I make this decision having lost faith in the American legal system, where my unprotected testimony served as entertainment and social media fodder,” she wrote. “I cannot afford to risk an impossible bill — one that is not just financial but also psychological, physical and emotional.”

Depp and Heard were originally married in 2015 but divorced 15 months later in 2016, before the actress wrote an op-ed for The Washington Post in 2018 about her own experiences with sexual assault and harassment in her personal life and career, as well as what she identified as a culture in Hollywood that protects abusers.

In March 2019, Depp filed a $50 million defamation suit against Heard over the op-ed, with the complaint stating that despite Depp not being explicitly named, it would be clear Heard was referencing him in the piece. In May 2022, a jury ruled in his favor on three of his claims and against him on just one, awarding him over $10 million. It also awarded Heard $2 million for statements made by Depp’s lawyer. Both sides appealed the verdict before Heard publicly announced the settlement on Dec. 19.

In 2020, Depp had his libel cast against U.K. outlet The Sun dismissed.