"JOHNNY Depp has furiously accused fashion chiefs of dragging his ex-girlfriend Kate Moss "through the mud" over her cocaine abuse.
The screen icon, 42, is bitter that many dumped her and insisted: "Kate should live her life how she wants to."
Johnny, who himself has battled booze and drugs, said: "It was unbelievably unfair the way she was treated.
"She was dragged through the mud. She's not running for office, she ain't looking to be the next Messiah.
"She's not out there philosophising or pretending to be a goody-two-shoes, she's a human being.
"Someone's in a situation that's been picked on and dissected. You have to deal with that at one level.
"Then you have this attempt at global embarrassment, and that's not showing support.
"No one is without some degree of flaw. We're all horribly flawed in some way." And he told the Daily Mirror: "I think Kate should live her life how she wants to.
"She's no dummy, man. She's very sharp, she's a great girl, she's a real good kid and I care about her a great deal.
"Like everyone, I want her to be OK. I want her and her kiddie to be OK.
"She should just do what she needs to do for herself and her kid and that's it."
The actor, who dated her for four years until 1998, praised mum-of-one Kate for spending a month in rehab. He added: "She's going through what she has to go through. She's living her life.
"We haven't been in touch since it all broke but I have tried to show my support for her, obviously."
And he denied claims in one downmarket newspaper that he sent her a mirror as a gift while she was in the Arizona clinic.
Johnny said: "It has been written that I sent her some present but it's absolute fiction - and not very good fiction at that".
[...]
But Charlie and the Chocolate Factory star Johnny told how he too once struggled to beat drink and drugs.
He said: "There was a great period of confusion when nothing made sense to me.
"So I indulged in hard liquor and drugs in an attempt not to feel, to self-medicate. But all it did was postpone the inevitable.
"I never, luckily, had a great problem. I never got so into a drug that I couldn't get out. It wasn't necessarily about drugs for me, it was more whatever it took to numb the pain or ease the confusion. Ultimately it was so dumb."
The star, married to French singer Vanessa Paradis, believes being a dad to Lily Rose, six, and Jack, three, made him clean up his act.
He explained: "There came a point where I'd just had enough. I think it was the point in my life when I was about to become a father.
"Then my first child arrived and in that millisecond you have a whole slew of realisations. They attack you.
"I had that moment where I thought, 'Oh, now I get it. Now I understand what it's all about'.
"I realised I'd wasted a lot of years being a dumb-ass. But at the same time it's what I went through and made me who I am"."
From Mirror
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