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re: WOW Dig Deep MR TRUMP Your Mouthy Comments & Malicious Posts Cost You $83.3MIL
TRUMP Returns to Court Next Week For NEW E Jean Carroll Trial – And It Could Prove Costly
Former president cannot dispute facts of case – that he sexually assaulted former Elle writer – so trial will focus on scale of damages
The Guardian 15 JAN 2024
E Jean Carroll and Donald Trump. ‘The fact that TRUMP sexually abused – indeed, raped – Ms Carroll has been conclusively established,’ the judge has said.
Trial Twist: George Conway Reveals He’s Admitted Into Evidence in Carroll Case
TRUMP will be back in the court next week, facing a new defamation case brought by E. Jean Carroll. Conservative Attorney George Conway reveals to The Weekend co-hosts that he has been admitted into evidence in the case.
After Donald Trump last week faced the prospect of a $370m fine and potential collapse of his real estate empire in New York state court, he will now contend with yet another costly legal battle in Manhattan: a defamation case brought by a woman who, according to a jury of her peers, was sexually abused by the former US president.
On Tuesday, TRUMP will once again be on trial over the former Elle writer E Jean Carroll’s sexual assault claims against him – his second such proceeding in less than a year.
This trial – which comes as Trump also deals with a host of criminal cases against him – will play out at Manhattan federal court, just hundreds of feet away from the courthouse where the team of the New York attorney general, Letitia James, argued that he committed massive civil fraud.
Carroll has said that TRUMP raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room around late 1995; her statement was first published by New York magazine, from a portion of her then forthcoming book What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal.
TRUMP denied Carroll’s claims, saying: “I’ve never met this person in my life. She is trying to sell a new book – that should indicate her motivation. It should be sold in the fiction section.” He also heaped further insults on her and accused her of being part of a political conspiracy.
Carroll sued TRUMP in 2019 over these statements, saying that TRUMPS’ denials damaged her reputation. At the time, Carroll could not sue TRUMP over her claim of sexual assault, as this was beyond the statute of limitations.
In 2022, however, New York state’s Adult Survivors Act – which, for a one-year period, permitted adult survivors of sexual misconduct to file civil suits against their alleged abusers – allowed Carroll to sue TRUMP again, this time over the claimed assault. That lawsuit, which also included defamation claims for statements TRUMP made after he was no longer president, went to trial in April 2023.
“I’m here because Donald Trump raped me and when I wrote about it, he said it didn’t happen. He lied and shattered my reputation. I’m here to try to get my life back,” Carroll said in harrowing court testimony.
Carroll won that lawsuit: after just three hours of deliberations, jurors found TRUMP liable of sexual assault and defamation, awarding her $5m.
TRUMPS’ upcoming trial will not relitigate Carroll’s claim of sexual assault. On 9 January, Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled that Trump cannot deny the sexual assault, pointing to a jury’s previous finding.
“Consequently, the fact that Mr Trump sexually abused – indeed, raped – Ms Carroll has been conclusively established and is binding in this case,” Kaplan also said.
“Mr Trump is precluded from offering any testimony, evidence, or argument suggesting or implying that he did not sexually assault Ms Carroll, that she fabricated her account of the assault, or that she had any motive to do so.”
This ruling means that TRUMP cannot fight Carrolls' claims at this trial. Jurors are tasked with deciding only if TRUMP defamed her with his 2019 statements and, if so, the financial penalties associated with said denial.
“He’s unlike any other client I could ever advise,” an expert told the Guardian. And if Trump attends Carroll’s trial, as he has claimed he will, it could hurt him even more.
“I think his presence in the courtroom would probably hurt him because I think he has such a machismo arrogant aura about him, and he’ll be very stern the entire time
E Jean Carroll watches as Donald Trumps’ video deposition is played in court during the first trial, in New York on 4 May 2023 in this courtroom sketch.
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