After a trial in New York, a jury has found Donald Trump liable for sexually abusing writer E Jean Carroll. Carroll, who is 79 years old, had sued the former president for allegedly raping her in a dressing room at a Bergdorf Goodman store in New York City in 1996, and for damaging her reputation by calling her a liar. However, the jury did not find Trump liable for the actual rape.
In the courtroom, the clerk read the verdict: “As to battery, did Ms Carroll prove that Mr Trump raped Ms Carroll?” The jury answered “No”.
However, although the jury did not find Trump liable for rape, they did conclude that he was more likely than not to have sexually abused E Jean Carroll and awarded her $2 million in damages. In addition, the jury found Trump liable for wanton disregard, for which Carroll was awarded $20,000, and for defamation, as they determined that he had made false statements about her.
The jury found that Trump had acted with actual malice and that Carroll had suffered injuries as a result, for which she was awarded $1 million. She was also awarded $1.7 million for the harm done to her reputation. Overall, Carroll was awarded $5 million in damages.
The jury, whose identities have not been made public, was instructed by Judge Lewis Kaplan that they were allowed to speak about their experience and to publicly identify themselves as jurors. However, he also advised them not to go public.
“Not now, and not for a long time,” he said, according to Law & Crime.
“I suggest you not identify yourselves,” he told the jury just before they left the courtroom, according to Inner City Press.
Judge Kaplan also directed the jury not to identify other members of the group.
As the verdict was read out, Ms Carroll sat emotionless in the front row beside her attorneys Roberta Kaplan and Shawn Crowley. She nodded her head as Judge Lewis Kaplan thanked the jury for paying close attention to the evidence, “even when it wasn’t riveting”.
According to the testimony of Ms. Lebowitz, E Jean Carroll slept with a loaded gun at her cabin in upstate New York after receiving death threats from supporters of Mr. Trump. Trump himself did not testify in the case, but the jury was presented with his deposition, in which he mistakenly identified his second wife Marla Maples as Ms. Carroll.