2022 a Big Year for Celebrity Trials. More Are Expected in 2023

Johnny Depp v. Amber Heard became the biggest story in America

Perhaps the biggest case to go to trial in 2022 was Johnny Depp’s defamation lawsuit against his ex-wife, Amber Heard. Depp sued Heard for defamation, claiming she ruined his reputation by insinuating in a 2018 Washington Post op-ed that she had been the victim of domestic violence, and he claimed he had been the real victim in their marriage.

Heard countersued and spent several days on the stand describing multiple incidents in which she alleged Depp abused her before and during their marriage.

After a six-week trial that quickly became the biggest talking point in America, the jury largely sided with Depp, ordering Heard to pay him $15 million in damages. The jury also found Depp liable for defamation, but only for one of the three complaints Heard made. The damage award was also much lower, just $2 million. Both Depp and Heard have appealed, so this story is far from over.

Harvey Weinstein faced a second sex crimes trial in Los Angeles

Weinstein, the man who set off the Me Too movement, found himself back in court this year when he was extradited to face criminal rape charges in Los Angeles. On December 19, a Los Angeles jury found Weinstein guilty of three out of seven sexual assault and rape charges from four women. 

The highest possible sentence on all charges he was convicted of is 60 years to life in prison. Weinstein is already serving a 23-year sentence after a New York jury found him guilty of third-degree rape and a first-degree criminal sexual act in February 2020.

Weinstein has repeatedly denied assaulting any of his accusers, saying all the sexual encounters were consensual.

Kevin Spacey was cleared in Anthony Rapp’s Me Too lawsuit

In October, Spacey was cleared in a lawsuit filed by “Rent” actor Anthony Rapp, who claimed the “House of Cards” star touched him inappropriately at a house party in 1986, when Spacey was 26 and Rapp was 14.  Rapp first spoke publicly about the allegation at the height of the Me Too movement, in a story for BuzzFeed News.

Rapp’s case suffered a major loss before the trial. An anonymous second man who Rapp sued with initially, who also claimed to have been assaulted by Spacey at the age of 14, was removed from the case after the judge ordered him to reveal his identity. The judge also threw out two of the three complaints Rapp sued for, leaving the jury with just one count of battery to decide.

In the end, the jury sided with Spacey. But the Oscar-winning actor’s legal woes are far from over since he’s facing criminal sexual abuse charges in the UK.

A mistrial was declared in Danny Masterson’s rape trial

The former “That ’70s Show” star was found not guilty on criminal rape charges in November after a Los Angeles jury failed to reach a verdict in the case.

Three women testified during the trial claiming that Masterson raped them and that the Church of Scientology, of which Masterson is a prominent member, tried to silence them. Masterson denied the allegations. 

The jury couldn’t come to a unanimous conclusion on any of the three charges. For the first count, 10 of the 12 jurors voted for acquittal. Eight jurors voted not guilty on the second. The decision on the third count was split, with seven voting not guilty, five voting guilty.

A re-trial is tentatively scheduled for March 27.

R. Kelly faced a second sex crimes trial

A federal jury in Chicago found musician R. Kelly guilty of producing child pornography and abusing minors in September.

The R&B star, whose real name is Robert Sylvester Kelly, was found guilty on three counts of child pornography and three counts of child enticement but was acquitted on a fourth pornography count and a conspiracy to obstruct justice charge. He is set to be sentenced in that case in February.

It was the second sex-crime trial Kelly has faced in the last two years. In June, a federal judge in Brooklyn sentenced Kelly to 30 years in prison after New York prosecutors proved he ran a decades-long sex-trafficking enterprise through his music business. 

Oscar-winning filmmaker Paul Haggis was ordered to pay $10 million to his rape victim

Publicist Haleigh Breest took filmmaker Paul Haggis to trial in October in New York City, alleging the filmmaker raped her at his apartment in 2013. 

Haggis, the director of “Crash” and writer of “Million Dollar Baby,” denied Breest’s allegation, and his lawyers tried to push the theory that the Church of Scientology was behind Breest’s complaint. 

Haggis was a member of the church for decades before publicly quitting in 2009 and said the church has been after him ever since. 

But Breest kept the tights she wore that night which showed a DNA connection to Haggis, and told multiple friends about the incident afterward, strengthening her case. 

When the trial wrapped in November, the jury ordered Haggis to pay Breest $7.5 million in compensatory damages and $2.5 million in punitive damages.

E. Jean Carroll’s rape allegation against Donald Trump will be the focus at defamation trial scheduled for April

The defamation lawsuit filed by longtime Elle advice columnist E. Jean Carroll against former President Trump stems from her accusations that Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman changing room in the mid-1990s. When Trump loudly denied Carroll’s story in 2019, she sued him for defamation.

The case is in limbo due to the Department of Justice’s attempt to have Trump removed as a defendant in the case. The DOJ’s argument is that since he made the comments while president, he can’t be sued for them because of a federal law that protects public servants from being individually sued for issues related to their job. Whether that case will move forward will be decided after oral arguments in January.

No matter the ruling in that appeal, Trump will find it hard to run from Carroll’s allegations, since she filed a second lawsuit in November. That lawsuit alleges that Trump defamed her a second time after he left the White House and sues Trump for the alleged rape by way of a battery charge.

Carroll was only recently able to sue for the alleged decades-old rape because of a  new New York law that opens a one-year window for adult survivors to sue regardless of when the incident took place. 

On April 17, FKA twigs will take ex Shia LaBeouf to trial on accusations of sexual battery

Musician FKA twigs’ sexual battery lawsuit against ex-boyfriend Shia LaBeouf is set to go to trial in Los Angeles on April 17, 2023. FKA twigs, whose real name is Tahliah Barnett, claims in court documents that LaBeouf was physically and emotionally abusive throughout their relationship, which started in 2018 and lasted just under a year.

Among the allegations detailed in the lawsuit are Barnett’s claims that LaBeouf knowingly gave her a sexually transmitted disease and grabbed her so hard he bruised her. LaBeouf denied each of Barnett’s allegations in his response to her lawsuit. 

Kevin Spacey to face trial in the UK

In May 2022, the UK’s Crown Prosecution Service announced it would charge Spacey with four counts of sexual assault against three men, as well as an additional count of “causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without consent.” The alleged incidents happened between March 2005 and April 2013, when Spacey was artistic director of the Old Vic theater in London. That case is set to go to trial in June 2023.

Spacey was hit with three more counts of sexual assault in the UK in November, all stemming from the accusations of a single complainant. The Crown Prosecution Service did not return Insider’s request for comment on whether those charges will be part of the June trial. Spacey made an initial court appearance in connection to those charges on December 15, but did not enter a plea at the time.