Donald Trump has been ordered to pay $83 million (£65 million) to the writer E Jean Carroll after he called her a liar for accusing him of sexual assault.
The jury of seven men and two women awarded Ms Carroll $7.3 million in compensatory damages, $11 million for costs to repair her reputation and $65 million in punitive damages – more than triple the sum her lawyers had sought.
The hefty fine has dealt yet another blow to Mr Trump, who in 2023 was found liable for sexually assaulting and defaming Ms Carroll, with the former president branded the latest ruling “absolutely ridiculous”.
“I fully disagree with both verdicts, and will be appealing this whole Biden Directed Witch Hunt focused on me and the Republican Party,” he wrote on Truth Social.
“Our 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!”
Mr Trump had earlier stormed out of the New York court room while Ms Carroll’s lawyer Roberta Kaplan was delivering her closing arguments.
Ms Carroll, 80, was awarded the damages for denials Mr Trump made in 2019 when he said Ms Carroll should “pay dearly” for claiming he had raped her in the mid-1990s in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in Manhattan.
Using a play on Mr Trump’s own words, Ms Kaplan said during her closing arguments: “Now is the time to make him pay, and now is the time to make him pay for it dearly.
“We all have to follow the law,” Ms Kaplan said. “Donald Trump, however, acts as if these rules and laws just don’t apply to him.”
She said the jury should award $12 million (£9.4 million) to repair Ms Carroll’s reputation and another $12 million for the suffering she has endured because of Mr Trump’s attacks. She said the “unusually high punitive award” was necessary “to have any hope of stopping Donald Trump”.
Outside the court house, Mr Trump’s lead attorney Alina Habba attacked the decision, jurors and “corrupt” restrictions she said the defence had been put under by the court.
Ms Habba said the court record would give Mr Trump’s attorneys perfect grounds to appeal.
“We will immediately appeal. We will set aside that ridiculous jury and I just want to remind you all in one thing: I will continue with President Trump to fight for everybody’s First Amendment right to speak. Everybody has a right to defend themselves when they are wrongfully accused.”
Ms Habba said her client had “abided by this corrupt system we have seen,” and said the judge had edited the questions Mr Trump could be asked on the stand as well as the answers.
“This is wrong, this is wrong, but we are in the state of New York, before a New York jury, and that is why we are seeing these witch hunts.”
Mr Trump, who was not required to attend the civil lawsuit proceedings, had appeared agitated all morning, vigorously shaking his head as Ms Carroll’s lawyer branded him a liar who had incited a “social media mob” to attack her client.
The unexpected departure prompted Judge Lewis Kaplan, who is not related to E J Carroll’s lawyer, to speak up, briefly interrupting the closing argument to say: “The record will reflect that Mr Trump just rose and walked out of the courtroom.”
Mr Trump did not return for the reminder of the closing argument but was present in court when his legal team began making their case.
Threatened to send lawyer to jail
The walkout came only minutes after the judge, without the jury present, threatened to send Mr Trump’s lawyer Ms Habba to jail for continuing to talk when he told her she was finished.
“You are on the verge of spending some time in the lock-up. Now sit down,” he said.
Ms Habba was later heard saying “f— it” after the judge ruled that the defence would not be permitted to show slides of offensive tweets Ms Carroll had received before Mr Trump made defamatory statements against Ms Carroll.
Mr Trump had earlier taken the stand for less than five minutes after Judge Lewis Kaplan narrowed the confines of his testimony.
(BBC)
