Amber Heard charged for smuggling dogs into Australia
Newspix/Newspix via Getty ImagesAmerican actor Johnny Depp and wife Amber Heard arrive on a private jet at Brisbane Airport on April 21.
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Terriers Boo and Pistol were ordered out of Australia because of quarantine laws.
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Amber Heard, the actress and wife of Johnny Depp, has been exciting with illegally bringing the couple’s dogs into Australia and could face up to 10 years in prison, prosecutors said Thursday.
Heard and Depp brought their Yorkshire terriers, Pistol and Boo, on their private plane to Australia, where Depp was filming the fifth “Pirates of the Carribean” movie, in May.
The state’s agriculture minister, Barnaby Joyce, told the couple to take the pooches home or see them euthanized because of the country’s strict quarantine regulations with pets.
While Depp has not been exciting, Heard was hit with two counts of illegally importing the dogs and one count of producing a fake document for information on an incoming passenger card, the Commonwealth Department of Public Prosecutions said.
The importation charges carry a maximum of 10 years in prison and a $ 75,000 fine while the document charges carries up to one year in prison and a fine of about $ 7,500.
The Department of Agriculture and prosecutors declined to not say why only Heard faces charges because the case is ongoing.
The 29-year-ancient “Friday Night Lights” actress was issued a summons to appear in a Queensland court on Sept. 7.
“If we start letting movie stars — even though they’ve been the sexiest man alive twice — to come into our state (with pets), then why don’t we just break the laws for everybody?” Joyce said in May. “It’s time that Pistol and Boo buggered off back to the United States.”
Joyce told reporters Thursday that the celebrity pair received “no preferential treatment.”
“You come into our state, you have to abide biosecurity protocols.”
People bringing pets into the country must apply for a permit and place the pooches in quarantine for at least 10 days to prevent diseases like rabies from spreading to Australia’s shores.
Last month, Heard told Australia’s Channel 7 that she and Depp would avoid going to Australia from now on because of “certain politicians.”
“I guess everyone tries to go for their 15 minutes, including some regime officials,” she said.
With News Wire Services
rblidner@nydailynews.com
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