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re: White House Staff Told Higher-Ups About TRUMP's Sexual Harassment To Women
TRUMP 'Knows What He Did', Lawyer Alleges as Civil RAPE Trial Draws to Close
Jury hears closing remarks in Donald Trump civil rape case
BBC News 9 MAY 2023
A lawyer for a writer accusing Donald Trump of rape in a civil trial urged a jury to hold the ex-president liable for the alleged assault.
"No one, not even a former president, is above the law," lawyer Roberta Kaplan said on Monday.
E Jean Carroll alleges Mr Trump raped her in a New York department store in the mid-1990s, which he denies.
In closing remarks in New York, Mr Trump's legal team accused Ms Carroll of "bringing a false claim".
The nine-member jury are due to begin deliberations on Tuesday morning in the civil rape and defamation trial against the former president, after they receive instructions from US District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who is not related to Roberta Kaplan.
The jury has been hearing arguments over the past two weeks in a Manhattan federal court.
In their closing statement, Ms Carroll's attorneys focused on previous remarks Mr Trump has made about women.
Ms Kaplan pointed to Mr Trump's controversial remarks in a 2005 Access Hollywood tape, which emerged publicly in 2016.
Referring to the comments, she said: "He kissed [women] without consent, he grabbed them, he did not wait."
She argued the remarks had been a "playbook" for how he treated Ms Carroll and other women.
Ms Kaplan also said "self-blame" had kept Ms Carroll from going to the police for decades.
In his closing statement, Mr Trump's lawyer Joe Tacopina focused on seeking to cast doubt on the details of Ms Carroll's story, which he at one point called "a work of fiction".
He questioned why Ms Carroll could not specify the date of the assault, arguing that stripped Mr Trump of the chance to provide an alibi.
It was "not a coincidence" none of the witnesses Ms Carroll had called could provide an exact date, he argued.
He also raised questions about the scene of the alleged assault, calling it "unbelievable" it could have occurred in a popular department store without any employees to witness it.
Mr Tacopina argued the story had been "ripped from the pages of Law and Order SVU", referring to a 2012 episode of the popular crime show in which a woman was raped in the lingerie department of a Bergdorf Goodman store.
Ms Carroll has acknowledged her alleged assault occurred in the same place as the episode, which was released before she came forward with her allegation in 2019, but she said that was a coincidence.
"What's the likelihood of that?" Mr Tacopina asked.
The former president did not appear at the trial in person but instead was present in a video of an October deposition played for the court.
"It's the most ridiculous, disgusting story," Mr Trump said in the video. "It's just made up."
Ms Carroll, 79, has accused Mr Trump, 76, of attacking her in 1995 or 1996, and then defaming her by denying it happened.
Jurors in the trial heard days of graphic testimony. Ms Carroll told jurors she had been left "unable to ever have a romantic life again" after the alleged attack.
A former columnist for Elle magazine, Ms Carroll was able to bring the civil case against Mr Trump after New York passed the Adult Survivors Act in 2022.
The act allowed a one-year period for victims to file sexual assault lawsuits in the state over claims that would have normally exceeded statute limitations.
MORE;
A THIRD Woman Accuses TRUMP of Sexual Assault at E. Jean Carroll Civil Rape Trial
Through tears, Natasha Stoynoff, an author and freelance journalist, told the court Trump assaulted her at Mar-a-Lago on Dec. 27, 2005, when she was on assignment for People magazine covering his one-year wedding anniversary.
Stoynoff said during a day of interviewing Trump and his new wife, Melania, Trump led the reporter to an empty room on the premises, where he cornered and started kissing her against her will after closing the door.
“I went in first and I’m looking around, I’m thinking, ‘Wow, really nice room, wonder what he wants to show me.’ And he — I hear the door shut behind me. And by the time I turn around, he has his hands on my shoulders and he pushes me against the wall and starts kissing me, holding me against the wall,” Stoynoff testified.
Trump is on trial in Manhattan federal court facing sexual battery and defamation claims. Carroll, 79, alleges he raped her on an unoccupied floor of Bergdorf Goodman in the mid-1990s after they ran into each other in a chance encounter, and he asked her to help pick out a present for an unnamed woman.
The longtime advice columnist says Trump defamed her in an October 2022 Truth Social post that alleged she made the whole thing up and that he had never met her.
Stoynoff’s account is one of three the jury has heard accusing Trump of sexually assaulting a woman at random, refusing to stop when they fought back, and disparaging their looks when they came forward. The allegations span a 26-year period.
Stoynoff told the jury she covered the Trump beat for People magazine and had interviewed him eight or nine times before the alleged incident. She said it occurred on a break during a long day of interviews, when a heavily pregnant Melania was getting changed after a shoot by the swimming pool, and Trump invited her to come look at a painting.
Stoynoff said Trump stopped what he was doing when his head butler walked in, who was her point-of-contact while she was on assignment at Trump’s Florida residence.
“I don’t know if he saw, but to my mind, I gave [the butler] a kind of a ‘get me out of here’ look, and I felt like he understood,” Stoynoff said.
After the alleged assault, Stoynoff said she had to interview the newlyweds together. As she and Trump walked over to meet his new wife via a patio, Stoynoff described him making several jarring comments.
“He said, Oh, you know we are going to have an affair, don’t you? You know, don’t forget what — don’t forget what Marla said, best sex she ever had. We are going to go for steak, we are going to go to Peter Luger’s. We’re going to have an affair,” Stoynoff quoted Trump in court.
Stoynoff described being shell-shocked.
“I was so shocked and flustered at what had just transpired and what was transpiring that, like, I couldn’t get words out. I was just like choked up. I couldn’t answer him,” Stoynoff told the jury.
When she left Mar-a-Lago, Stoynoff told a professor she was close with from journalism school, a close friend, and her direct supervisor at People, she testified. She told the jury she didn’t want to run it further up the chain out of fear they’d kill the magazine story, and Trump would seek revenge against her.
Stoynoff told the court the following year, she bumped into Melania with her new baby, Barron, outside Trump Tower, who asked why they didn’t see her anymore.
Stoynoff, who’s Canadian, told jurors she wasn’t registered to vote in the U.S. and often voted for conservative politicians in her home country. She decided to come forward with her allegations shortly after the “Access Hollwyood” tape was leaked when Trump was running for president and he denied sexual misconduct allegations.
”I actually for the first time thought to myself, oh, he does this to a lot of women. It’s not just me. It’s not just something I did,” Stoynoff told the court in emotional testimony.
Carroll’s lawyers played the infamous clip when Trump said, “grab ‘em by the p---y,” with most of the jurors watching with blank expressions.
Toward the end of Stoynoff’s testimony, jurors saw footage of Trump telling a crowd: “Look at her. Look at her words. You tell me. I don’t think so.”
“I am assuming he means that I am unattractive,” Stoynoff said in court.
Trump’s lawyer Joe Tacopina asked Stoynoff one question on cross-examination, whether she had sued Trump. She said no.
After Stoynoff’s testimony, Carroll’s lawyers played part of Trump’s deposition from their litigation last year. In the footage, a combative Trump said Carroll had invented a “ridiculous, disgusting story.”
“It’s just made up,” Trump said.
The jury will see more portions of the deposition on Thursday. The Daily News previously reported on unsealed excerpts of the deposition, when Trump called Carroll a “whack job,” “nut job,” and “sick, mentally sick.”
Earlier Wednesday, Trump’s lawyers said they would not present any witnesses to defend against writer E. Jean Carroll’s claim the former president brutally raped her at Bergdorf Goodman.
Trump originally had two people on his witness list: himself and psychiatrist Edgar Nace, who his lawyers told the court could not make it. Trump’s legal team said Monday that he didn’t plan to take the stand.
Asked by reporters in Ireland Wednesday why he was there at his golf course and not at the trial, Trump made vague reference to a “longstanding agreement,” according to video clips of the question.
“I hear things are going really well in New York,” he said.
Judge Lewis Kaplan told jurors they would likely begin their deliberations early next week.
During the first half of Wednesday’s proceedings, jurors heard from an expert witness for Carroll, clinical psychologist Leslie Lebowitz, who testified about her extensive evaluation of Carroll.
Lebowitz said she determined Carroll had suffered significantly due to the alleged assault, including experiencing unwanted intrusive thoughts.
When he cross-examined Carroll last week, Trump’s lawyer Joe Tacopina asked why she didn’t scream during the alleged assault or call the police. He also tried to pick apart her memories of when the assault occurred. Carroll has acknowledged throughout the years-long litigation that she doesn’t know exactly which year it happened between 1994 and 1996.
Lebowitz said stress hormones released during a traumatic encounter can interfere with one’s instincts. She said it’s common for victims to remember intricate details about an event and forget broader ones, like forgetting how they left, where it happened, or when it happened.
Lebowitz said her sit-downs with Carroll, over a course of 20 to 22 hours, determined she had diminished self-esteem due to the attack and avoidance, causing a complete shutdown of her ability to be intimate with another person.
During Lebowitz’s cross-examination, Trump’s lawyer Chad Seigel drew several sustained objections for asking argumentative questions, which frustrated Judge Kaplan.
The defense lawyer also peppered Lebowitz with questions about whether Carroll was diagnosed with psychiatric issues directly from the assault. Lebowitz said she hadn’t been, though she said Carroll displayed multiple symptoms associated with post-traumatic stress disorder.
“[It] made her feel like she was worth less than she had been before. She felt degraded and diminished. She felt like she had been treated as if she wasn’t even a person,” Lebowitz said.
Trump denies all wrongdoing.
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