Johnny Depp's defamation case delayed again

Johnny Depp's defamation case against ex-wife Amber Heard has hit another roadblock and now won't be tried until next year.

The movie stars were scheduled to face-off in a Virginia courtroom in early May, but they are now expected to take the stand in April 2022 for a two-week trial.

The proceedings have been postponed multiple times and were paused in September to accommodate Depp's filming schedules, but according to Deadline the latest delay is due to backlogs in the state’s court system because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The actor is suing his ex for $50 million (£35.4 million) over comments the Aquaman actress made in a Washington Post article about being a victim of domestic abuse. The December 2018 piece didn't name the actor, but Depp alleged the op-ed damaged his reputation and cost him a role in a Pirates of the Caribbean reboot.

In his suit, Depp's lawyers insisted their client was the real victim in the couple's short-lived marriage, which ended in a nasty divorce during which Heard claimed Johnny had abused her.

"Mrs. Heard is not a victim of domestic abuse, she is a perpetrator," the suit read.

Meanwhile, Depp is still fighting for an appeal in his libel case against the publishers of The Sun newspaper in the U.K. over an article, in which he was called "a wife beater". The actor lost that case last year after Mr. Justice Nicol ended the proceedings by declaring Depp put Heard in "fear for her life" three times, adding he found The Sun's description of the actor as "a wife beater" was "substantially true".