08th September 2023.
New York, USA – A federal judge has ruled that former President Donald Trump is liable for defamatory comments he made in 2019 about writer E. Jean Carroll. The decision by Judge Lewis Kaplan, delivered on Wednesday, specifies that Ms. Carroll’s second civil defamation trial against the former President will now focus solely on determining the damages owed to her.
The case stems from Ms. Carroll’s accusations against Mr. Trump, in which she alleged that he had raped her at a department store in the 1990s. Mr. Trump vehemently denied these allegations, leading Ms. Carroll to file her first defamation suit against him in November of the same year. In that suit, she claimed that Mr. Trump’s statements had not only damaged her reputation but also caused her emotional harm.
This recent ruling by Judge Kaplan is separate from a civil trial held in May, during which a New York jury found Mr. Trump liable for defamation for dismissing Ms. Carroll’s accusations as “a hoax and a lie.” While Mr. Trump was not found liable for the alleged rape, he was ordered to pay Ms. Carroll $5 million as a result of that New York civil lawsuit.
Judge Kaplan’s 25-page decision in the second defamation case emphasized that the May verdict had already established that Mr. Trump had made statements about the assault with “actual malice.” Consequently, the upcoming second defamation case will exclusively determine the amount of compensation Mr. Trump should pay to Ms. Carroll for his comments.
Typically, a jury would decide whether a defendant is liable for damages, but in this instance, the focus will be on quantifying the compensation owed to Ms. Carroll. The trial for this matter is scheduled for January 15, 2024.
Ms. Carroll initially came forward with her sexual assault claims in a 2019 New York Magazine article. Mr. Trump has consistently denied the allegations, asserting that he had never met the former Elle Magazine columnist and suggesting that she fabricated the story to boost book sales.
Apart from the Carroll case, Mr. Trump is currently facing various other legal challenges, including state and federal charges related to his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 election results and his handling of classified documents.
