Trump found liable for sexual abuse of columnist; ex-US president calls it ‘witch-hunt’

Former US president Donald Trump on Tuesday (May 9) was found liable for sexually abusing advice columnist E. Jean Carroll in 1996, by a jury which also awarded the accuser USD 5 million in a judgment that could haunt the former president as he campaigns to regain the White House.

Reacting to the verdict, Trump has called it a “disgrace” and the “greatest witch hunt of all time.”

“This verdict is a disgrace – a continuation of the greatest witch hunt of all time,” the former president posted on his Truth Social media platform.

Trump, who did not attend the trial, has insisted he never sexually assaulted Carroll or even knew her.

The verdict against Trump was announced in a federal courtroom in New York City on the first day of jury deliberations. Jurors rejected Carroll’s claims that she was raped, but found Trump liable for sexually abusing her.

Hours earlier, US District Judge Lewis A. Kaplan read instructions on the law to the nine-person jury before the panel began discussing Carroll’s allegations of battery and defamation shortly before noon.

Kaplan told jurors that the first question on the verdict form was to decide whether they think there is more than a 50 per cent chance that Trump raped Carroll inside a store dressing room. If they answered yes, they would then decide whether compensatory and punitive damages should be awarded.

If they answered no on the rape question, they could then decide if Trump subjected her to lesser forms of assault involving sexual contact without her consent or forcible touching to degrade her or gratify his sexual desire. If they answered yes on either of those questions, they will decide if damages are appropriate.

On defamation claims stemming from a statement Trump made on social media last October, Kaplan said jurors needed to be guided by a higher legal standard clear and convincing evidence.

He said they would have to agree it was “highly probable” that Trump’s statement was false and was made maliciously with deliberate intent to injure or out of hatred or ill will with reckless disregard for Carroll’s rights.

Trump never attended the trial, which is in its third week, and rejected an invitation to testify, which the judge extended through the weekend even after Trump’s attorney, Joe Tacopina, said on Thursday that his client would not testify.

Tacopina told the jury in closing arguments Monday that Carroll’s account is too far-fetched to be believed. He said she made it up to fuel sales of a 2019 memoir in which she first publicly revealed her claims and to disparage Trump for political reasons.

Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, cited excerpts from Trump’s October deposition and his notorious comments on a 2005 “Access Hollywood” video in which he said celebrities can grab women between the legs without asking.

She urged jurors to believe her client.

“He didn’t even bother to show up here in person,” Kaplan said. She said much of what he said in his deposition and in public statements “actually supports our side of the case.”

“In a very real sense, Donald Trump is a witness against himself,” she said. “He knows what he did. He knows that he sexually assaulted E. Jean Carroll.”

Carroll, 79, testified that she had a chance encounter with Trump at the Bergdorf Goodman store across the street from Trump Tower. She said it was a lighthearted interaction in which they teased each other about trying on a piece of lingerie before Trump became violent inside a dressing room.

Tacopina told jurors there was no reason to call Trump as a witness when Carroll can’t even recall when her encounter with Trump happened.

He told the jury Carroll made up her claims after hearing about a 2012 “Law and Order” episode in which a woman is raped in the dressing room of the lingerie section of a Bergdorf Goodman store.

“They modelled their secret scheme on an episode of one of the most popular shows on television,” he said of Carroll.

Two of Carroll’s friends testified that she told them about the encounter with Trump shortly after it happened, many years before the “Law and Order” episode aired.

(With inputs from agencies)