Testimony will begin Wednesday in E. Jean Carroll’s damages trial against Donald Trump, with the writer on the witness stand and the former president, who was found liable for sexually abusing and defaming her, expected to be in the courtroom.
Carroll, 80, will tell the New York federal court jury in the defamation case how her life turned upside down after Trump, then the president, repeatedly slammed her publicly after she first came forward in 2019 with allegations that he sexually assaulted her in a dressing room in a Manhattan department store in 1996.
“Ms. Carroll will tell you that there has not been a day that’s gone by since Donald Trump first defamed her that she has not been afraid. She’ll tell you how, in some ways, it’s actually changed the way she has lived her life,” her attorney Shawn Crowley told jurors in her opening statement Tuesday.
Trump “didn’t just deny the assault” when Carroll broke her silence in a 2019 book — “he went much, much further,” Crowley said. “He said he had no idea who she was. He accused her of lying and making up a story to make money and to advance some political conspiracy against him. And he threatened her. He said she should pay dearly for speaking out against him.”
“Donald Trump was president when he made those statements, and he used the world’s biggest microphone to attack Ms. Carroll, to humiliate her and to destroy her reputation,” she said.
Trump, 77, was found liable last year for sexually abusing Carroll and defaming her after he left the White House in a separate civil trial and was hit with a $5 million verdict, which he’s appealing. U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan used that verdict to find Trump liable for the remarks he made while he was president, as well, so the jury in the current case will be deciding only what amount of damages to award her.
Crowley told the jurors that Trump had continued his attacks since the last verdict, including posting comments to his Truth Social platform while he was in court Tuesday.
“He sat in this courthouse this morning. And while he was sitting there, he posted more defamatory statements, more lies about Ms. Carroll and this case. By our count, by our last count, 22 posts just today. Think about that. Think about that when you consider how much money will it take to get him to stop,” she said.
Fresh off his victory in the Iowa caucuses Monday, Trump had been in court for jury selection Tuesday but left before opening statements to attend a campaign rally in New Hampshire. The juxtaposition of his subdued courtroom appearances and his boisterous campaign events is a harbinger of his year ahead. In addition to the Carroll trial, he also faces four criminal trials and a civil fraud trial that could devastate his real estate business while he seeks another term in the White House.
He has denied attacking Carroll and maintains the case is “fiction.”
His attorney Alina Habba told the jury Tuesday that Trump’s legal team will show Carroll shouldn’t get any damages because the “evidence will show that Ms. Carroll’s reputation was not harmed by President Trump’s statements. In fact, it’s the exact opposite. She has gained more fame, more notoriety than she could ever have dreamed of.”
“She is looking for you to give her a windfall because some people on social media said mean things about her. But in today’s day and age, the internet always has something to say, and it’s not always going to be nice,” Habba added.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
