Trump might testify at trial over defamation damages in intercourse abuse case, legal professionals say

NEW YORK — Lawyers for former President Donald Trump say he might testify at a mid-January civil trial set to resolve how a lot he owes a columnist for defaming her after she mentioned he sexually abused her three a long time in the past in a Manhattan luxurious division retailer.

The legal professionals filed papers in Manhattan federal courtroom late Thursday to request that Trump’s October 2022 deposition transcript within the case not be proven to the jury as a result of Trump “has been named as a witness to testify at this trial.”

The legal professionals – Alina Habba and Michael Madaio – didn’t reply to an electronic mail Friday searching for remark.

The columnist, 80-year-old E. Jean Carroll, is planning to testify on the trial, slated to begin Jan. 16, about how her life has been affected and threats she has confronted since Trump claimed that he by no means knew her and that she was making false accusations in opposition to him.

The former Elle journal columnist is searching for $10 million in compensatory damages and considerably extra in punitive damages after a jury at a Manhattan trial final May discovered she had been sexually abused by Trump in spring 1996 within the dressing room of a Bergdorf Goodman retailer throughout the road from Trump Tower, the place Trump resided.

Carroll testified at that trial that her flirtatious encounter with Trump appeared lighthearted and enjoyable as she accompanied him on a seek for a present for his pal within the retailer’s desolate lingerie space. But she mentioned it turned violent contained in the dressing room after they dared one another to attempt on a bit of lingerie.

She mentioned Trump shoved her in opposition to a wall and raped her. The jury rejected the rape declare, however agreed that he sexually abused her. It awarded $5 million for sexual abuse and defamation that occurred with feedback Trump made in fall 2022.

The defamation declare at stake within the January trial arose after Trump, whereas he was nonetheless president, angrily denounced the assertions Carroll first publicly made in a memoir revealed in 2019. That lawsuit has been delayed for years by appeals. Added to the lawsuit are claims that Trump defamed her once more with remarks he made publicly after the primary verdict.

Judge Lewis A. Kaplan dominated earlier this 12 months that the primary trial’s defamation verdict signifies that solely damages should be determined in January at a trial anticipated to final a couple of week. A brand new jury will probably be chosen for it. Kaplan has ordered the jurors be stored nameless, partly as a consequence of “Trump’s repeated public statements” about Carroll and numerous courts.

During the final trial earlier than Kaplan, Trump prompt in public remarks that he may attend the trial, however he by no means confirmed up.

In current months, although, he has testified at a civil trial in New York state courtroom over claims that the corporate he created to look at over his various properties fraudulently manipulated the worth of property to acquire loans.

And he has appeared in courtroom to plead not responsible to felony fees in 4 indictments, two of which accuse him of searching for to overturn the outcomes of the 2020 presidential election, in addition to a categorised paperwork case and fees that he helped prepare a payoff to porn actor Stormy Daniels to silence her earlier than the 2016 presidential election.

A request to postpone the January trial whereas points stay pending earlier than an appeals courtroom, together with whether or not Trump is protected by absolute immunity for remarks made whereas he was president, was rejected Thursday by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan.