On January 26, 2024, a federal jury in the U.S. district court in Manhattan ruled against former president Donald Trump, ordering him to pay $83.3 million to E. Jean Carroll for defaming her statements about him sexually assaulting her in a Manhattan department store dressing room in 1996. This verdict, in addition to the previous $5 million defamation verdict Carroll won over Trump last year, was announced less than three hours after deliberations began among the nine-member jury.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Throughout the trial, Judge Lewis Kaplan had minimal patience for Trump\u2019s attorneys during the closing arguments and his frequent outbursts, telling his attorney to sit down after overruling an objection. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
On his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump retorted, writing: Kaplan \u201cshould be sanctioned for his abuse of power \u2013 No wonder our country is going to Hell!\u201d Michael Madaio, one of Trump\u2019s attorneys, argued that Kaplan had exhibited \u201cgeneral hostility during towards the defense,\u201d asking him to recuse himself from the case. This request, however, was quickly denied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump did not appear in court for the reading of the verdict on punitive and compensatory damages but later released a statement on social media that he would appeal these claims. This meant that the funds would not be accessible to Carroll until all appeals were satisfied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump argued that he was prejudiced against posting, saying \u201cOur legal system is out of control, and being used as a Political Weapon. They have taken away all First Amendment Rights. THIS IS NOT AMERICA.\u201d Form IV student, Helena Stark, responds, \u201cI do believe the prosecutors are biased against Trump, but it is impossible to find an American who is unbiased\u2026Even if they are biased, they are still presenting serious allegations.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Carroll\u2019s lawyers argued for $24 million for punitive damages, an unusually high amount in hopes of ending his defamatory behavior. By continuously denying the allegation, Trump was destroying Carroll\u2019s reputation. She also received a variety of death threats, sometimes hundreds a day including one that read: \u201cRape Jean rape Jean,\u201d causing her to purchase a pitbull and bullets for an inherited gun which she now keeps by her bedside. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
When the verdict included $65 million for such statements, it sent a message that a jury of ordinary citizens was distrustful of Trump. After the ruling, Carroll\u2019s attorney, Roberta Kaplan said, \u201cToday\u2019s verdict proves that the law applies to everyone in our country, even the rich, even the famous, even former presidents. There\u2019s a way to stand up to someone like Donald Trump who cares more about wealth, fame and power than respecting the law.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite Trump\u2019s clear rage and fury as a result of this ruling, it is important to consider the implications for a man worth $2.6 billion. Form IV student Samantha Gold stated, \u201cI think for his case they need to drift away from financial punishments because it shows him no impact because he has so much money.\u201d In civil cases like this, the primary means to punish behavior is with financial penalties. Unfortunately, the wealthy are not as impacted by these large verdicts as they represent a small portion of their net worth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
On January 26, 2024, a federal jury in the U.S. district court in Manhattan ruled against former president Donald Trump, ordering him to pay $83.3 million to E. Jean Carroll for defaming her statements about him sexually assaulting her in a Manhattan department store dressing room in 1996. This verdict, in addition to the previous $5 million defamation verdict Carroll won over Trump last year, was announced less than three hours after deliberations began among<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":335,"featured_media":9017,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[427,318,320],"tags":[],"coauthors":[553],"class_list":["post-9016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-law","category-news","category-politics"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/02\/Screenshot-2024-02-14-at-11.17.13\u202fAM-e1707927496929.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/335"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9016"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9018,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9016\/revisions\/9018"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9016"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fieldstonnews.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=9016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}