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A jury in Manhattan on Tuesday found former President Donald J. Trump guilty of sexually abusing and defaming E. Gene Carroll and ordered her to pay $5 million in damages. Over the years, more than a dozen women have accused Trump of sexual misconduct, but this is the only one the jury has confirmed.
In a civil suit, a federal jury of six men and three women found that Carroll, a 79-year-old former magazine writer, sexually abused Mr. Trump in a Bergdorf Goodman division locker room nearly 30 years ago. determined that he/she has sufficiently proved that he/she has received shop in Manhattan. However, the jury did not find that he had raped her, as she had long claimed.
A jury delivered its verdict just before 3:00 p.m., finding that Trump defamed Carroll in October. Trump posted a statement on her own in October on her Truth Social platform calling her case a “total fraud.” work” and “hoaxes and lies”. His attorney said he plans to appeal.
Trump’s lawyers didn’t call witnesses, nor did he hear Carroll, who sued Trump last year, give instinctive testimony about an attack she said ended her romantic life forever. did not appear in court.
Carroll nodded as the court clerk read the ruling on Tuesday. Her nod became more pronounced when the secretary said Trump was responsible for defamation. She walked out of court holding hands with attorney Roberta A. Kaplan and grinning from ear to ear. A woman exclaimed to Carol, “You are so brave and beautiful.” “Thank you, thank you very much,” she replied.
In a subsequent statement she said:Today the world finally i know the truth This victory is not just for me, but for all the women who have suffered because they didn’t believe. “
For decades, Trump has enjoyed projecting an attractive male image onto women, manipulating tabloid headlines such as “Best Sex Ever” and writing a 1999 Playboy I’ve been featured in centerfold video introductions and bragged about caught interactions. As a celebrity, in a video about how he managed to grab a woman’s genitals without guilt.
Its unanimous verdict was handed down after just under three hours of deliberation. Findings are civil, not criminal. That means Trump has not been convicted of any crime and is not facing a prison sentence.
In post-judgment Truth Social posts, Trump went on to claim that he didn’t know Carroll. This verdict is dishonorable — the continuation of the greatest witch hunt in history!”
His attorney, Joseph Tacopina, said outside court that the case would be appealed. He also defended Trump’s absence from court and his decision not to testify in his own defense.
“It was a circus atmosphere. With him here, it’s like a circus,” Tacopina said.
He said Trump denied Carroll’s allegations in a deposition video played for the jury by Carroll’s attorney. He also said Carroll’s attorney should never have been allowed to play the “Access Hollywood” recording for a jury.
And he complained about Judge Louis A. Kaplan’s decision to let an anonymous jury hear the case.
Mr Tacopina also complained of “bias shown by the court”.
Mr Tacopina has occasionally clashed with Judge Kaplan, and based in part on his explanation of the Judge’s improper challenge by Ms Carroll’s lawyers, the malpractice case was based on “broad, unfair and biased rulings”. I even filed a motion for The question was argumentative.
At one point, Judge Kaplan quoted the definition of “controversial question” from the Black Law Dictionary and read it aloud to Mr. Tacopina.
In instructions to jurors on Tuesday, the judge outlined three options for holding Trump accountable for assault, which meant assaulting Ms Carroll. The judge explained that he would confirm that he had proven that it was likely true that he had committed the crime.
In criminal cases, when jurors are asked to assess guilt, they must meet a much higher standard, beyond reasonable doubt.
It is not clear why the jury chose mild abuse over rape. Sexual abuse is defined in New York as exposing a person to sexual contact without consent. Rape is defined by state law as sexual intercourse without consent that involves the insertion of the penis into the vaginal opening.
During the trial, Carroll, a former advice columnist for Elle magazine, a well-known name in Manhattan’s media circles, said the attack was sparked by a chance encounter one evening in Bergdorf, a fashionable department store on Fifth Avenue. was testifying. She said Trump asked her to help her buy a present for her female friend.
They reached the lingerie section, where he moved her to the changing room, closed the door, and began attacking her. , pushed a finger into her vagina.
She pushed back, stomped on her heels, used her knees to push Trump away, and fled the store. She kept the encounter a secret for over two decades, until she revealed it in a 2019 New York magazine excerpt from her book, except telling two of her friends.
Ms. Carroll and 10 other witnesses called on her behalf testified during the two-week trial. Among them were her friends, journalist and author Lisa Birnbach and former TV host Carol Martin. Her two other women have testified that Trump sexually assaulted them years ago.
Carroll said after New York enacted a new law last year that gave adult sexual abuse victims a one-year grace period to sue those who claim they were sexually abused, even if they had criminal charges. You could file a lawsuit even if the statute of limitations had passed.
“For too long, survivors of sexual assault have faced walls of suspicion and intimidation,” Kaplan, her attorney, said after the ruling. I expect and believe that it will be an important step in
Trump avoided a trial, but repeatedly attacked Carroll from out of court during the hearing. At first he was on Truth Social, and last week in an interview at a golf course in Ireland, where he suggested returning to New York to testify. in his own defense. After all, he didn’t.
In his closing argument, Mr Tacopina argued that Trump did not need to appear because the events in Bergdorf did not occur. He said he presented his client’s defense through cross-examination of Ms. Carol and her witnesses.
“If something is completely hoaxed,” Tacopina told jurors.
During this cross-examination, one of the areas he focused on was the testimony that Ms. Carroll did not scream during the assault.
“I’m not a screamer,” she replied, adding that she was panicking too much. “You can’t blame me for not screaming.”
Tacopina replied: I have a question for you, Carol. “
“No,” Carroll interjected. She said one of the reasons women don’t come forward is because “people always ask me why I didn’t scream. Some women scream. Some women don’t. It silences them.” “
Ms. Carol raised her voice as she testified.
The verdict comes as Trump faces a barrage of legal action. In April, he pleaded not guilty to a New York fraud charge stemming from hush money paid to a porn star and is facing a civil fraud lawsuit filed by the New York Attorney General.
Trump is also under investigation in Georgia for allegedly plotting to interfere in the 2020 election, with a federal special counsel citing the discovery of classified documents in Mar-a-Lago and the election leading up to the January election. is investigating Trump’s role in the events of Attack on the Houses of Parliament on June 6, 2021. Trump has denied wrongdoing in all cases, and he claims his lawsuits and investigations are meant to bring him down.
During her testimony, another attorney, Michael J. Ferrara, asked Carroll if she was happy to speak publicly about what Trump had done to her, or if she regretted it.
“I regretted this about 100 times, but in the end, being able to spend the day in court is what it’s all about,” she said. I am happy to do it.”
Nate Schweber, Hurubie Meko and Maggie Haberman contributed to the report.
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