Winona Ryder responds to Johnny Depp allegations
Winona Ryder is "shocked" at actress Amber Heard's allegations that Johnny Depp both physically and emotionally abused her during the course of their one-year marriage.
Ryder, who was once engaged to Depp, talked about the allegations in a new interview with Time, and says that the 53-year-old actor was never violent towards anyone during the four years they dated.
"I can only speak from my own experience, which was wildly different than what is being said," Ryder, 44, says. "He was never, never that way towards me. Never abusive at all towards me. I only know him as a really good, loving, caring guy who is very, very protective of the people that he loves."
Still, she stresses that she cannot personally speak about Heard's experience.
"I wasn't there. I don't know what happened," the "Stranger Things" actress says. "I'm not calling anyone a liar. I'm just saying, it's difficult and upsetting for me to wrap my head around it. Look, it was a long time ago, but we were together for four years, and it was a big relationship for me. Imagine if someone you dated when you were -- I was 17 when I met him -- was accused of that."
"It's just shocking," she adds. "I have never seen him be violent toward a person before."
Ryder and Depp met at the "Great Balls of Fire!" premiere in 1989, and were engaged a year later. They eventually split after four years together. Depp famously got a tattoo reading "Winona Forever," which he later had changed to "Wino Forever."
The "Heathers: star, who was 19 years old when they were engaged, called her relationship with Depp her "first real break-up" and her "first heartbreak" in a 2009 interview with Elle magazine.
"And I think it was really ironic because, like, everybody else just thought I had everything in the world, you know, I had no reason to be depressed, everything was sort of at its peak, but inside I was completely lost," Ryder said about dealing with their split at the height of her fame in the '90s.
"I remember feeling, 'I can't complain about anything, because I'm so lucky, I'm so lucky.' After that I realized I needed to take time off more," she continued.
Ryder isn't the only one of Depp's exes that's speaking out. In May, the mother of his two children, model Vanessa Paradis, defended the "Pirates of the Caribbean" actor against Heard's claims.
"He is a sensitive, loving and loved person, and I believe with all my heart that these recent allegations being made are outrageous," Paradis wrote. "In all the years I have known Johnny, he has never been physically abusive with me and this looks nothing like the man I live with for 14 wonderful years."
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