Judge Lewis Kaplan of Manhattan rejected Donald Trump’s request for a retrial in the sexual abuse lawsuit filed by columnist E. Jean Carroll. Earlier, a jury had awarded Carroll $5 million in this case.
Kaplan dismissed Trump’s plea, stating there was substantial, potentially overwhelming evidence that Trump had forcibly assaulted Carroll, which thoroughly supported the jury’s finding of sexual abuse.
Trump, the 45th president, sought a new trial arguing that the damage award was unjustifiably high given that he was not found guilty of rape by the jury.
However, Judge Kaplan disagreed, stating that the awarded sum was not disproportionately high and did not significantly deviate from a reasonable compensation.
Kaplan concluded that the jury’s verdict was not “a seriously erroneous result” or “a miscarriage of justice.”
In 2022, Carroll, 79, filed a lawsuit against Trump, alleging that he assaulted her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the 1990s.
In April, a Manhattan federal jury deemed the former president responsible for sexually abusing Carroll, the “Ask E. Jean” advice columnist, and for defaming her in an extensive October 2022 post on his social media platform, Truth Social, where he dismissed her allegations as a “hoax” and denied acquaintance with her.
Carroll has an ongoing case alleging that Trump defamed her in 2019 by denying any knowledge of her when she made her allegations public, which she claims harmed her reputation as a journalist.
Trump lodged an appeal against the verdict two days after the trial’s conclusion, and on Wednesday, he filed a notice of intent to appeal Judge Kaplan’s decision to reject his request for a retrial.
Following the court’s denial of Trump’s request for a new trial or to reduce the amount of the verdict, E. Jean Carroll anticipates receiving the $5 million in damages awarded to her by the jury, as stated by her lawyer, Roberta Kaplan. She also plans to continue her legal battle against Trump in a trial set to begin on January 15, 2024.
“Now that the court has denied Trump’s motion for a new trial or to decrease the amount of the verdict, E. Jean Carroll looks forward to receiving the $5 million in damages that the jury awarded her,” Carroll’s lawyer Roberta Kaplan said in a statement. “She also looks forward to continuing to hold Trump accountable for what he did to her at the trial in Carrol I, which is scheduled to begin on January 15, 2024.”
The judge’s decision comes amid news that Donald Trump expects to be indicted over his alleged role in the Capitol Riots on January 6.
