It was controversial when she mentioned it during the UK trial and has again raised eyebrows. But Amber Heard mentioning the very real rumor of Johnny Depp pushing Kate Moss down a flight of steps during their tumultuous relationship in the mid-90s has revived one of the more violent incidents in Johnny Depp’s past, an old news item some would have rather stayed buried.

October 31, 1996, I was at my sister-in-law’s Halloween party in Athens,  Georgia. She’d been throwing this shindig for almost a decade and, overtime, it had become an eclectic blend of people representing various points in her life. I was there the night River Phoenix died in 1993. The few of us who could drag ourselves off the couches and floors were up the next morning  talking about it. And exactly three years later, that event came up in another early early early morning talk that eventually bled into the topic of Johnny Depp and Kate Moss.

“I heard he pushed her off a chair in a hotel restaurant,” one said. Another corrected her. “No, I think he pushed her down some stairs somewhere, at least that’s what a tabloid said… Examiner? Enquirer?”

I’d heard a similar version as well. What we were likely referencing in our various stages of  intoxication were the events of one of Mr. Depp’s more notorious violent episodes. In 1994, Depp was arrested  when he destroyed a hotel room while fighting with then-girlfriend, 20 year old supermodel Kate Moss.  Though Depp testified in the 2020 UK case Moss slept through his rampage, reports at the time presented a somewhat different series of events.

After the incident, the LA Times reported Moss was with him, but doesn’t state she was sleeping.  CBS News reported other guests actually heard the two arguing. Guests reportedly were awakened at 5:30 a.m. by the sounds of shattering glass, snapping wood, and loud domestic squabbling. Police found both Depp and Moss very much awake sitting among the debris.

“Johnny Depp and Kate Moss got into an epic fight at New York City’s Mark Hotel, where Moss accused Depp of cheating on her,” says Robin Cherry of the Robb Report. “Police were called, and they found a ‘possibly intoxicated’ Depp and a disheveled Moss in the middle of their ravaged guest room. Depp was arrested… [and] claimed the damage was done by an armadillo that popped out of the closet.”

The couple broke up in 1997, reportedly because of Depp’s “intense mood swings.” 

“Kate was often on a razor’s edge with Johnny,” says Maureen Callahan, author of Champagne Supernovas.  “She was afraid of his rages.”

It really should come as no surprise that Amber Heard, former wife of Johnny Depp and who’s traveled in Hollywood circles for almost two decades, heard the stairs rumor as well. It’s likely she’s heard other things – before, during, and after her marriage to the former Pirates of the Caribbean star – which we’ll never know ourselves unless Johnny Depp’s legal team really believes introducing past relationships into the Fairfax Virginia trial will help him. Then some of Hollywood’s most guarded secrets about the fading former A-lister could come spilling out.