NEW YORK – A jury in a civil case has found former President Donald Trump sexually abused a magazine columnist in a New York department store in the 1990s.
But Trump was found not liable for raping Elizabeth Jean Carroll in the dressing room of Bergdorf Goodman.
The jury also found Trump liable for defamation for calling the writer’s accusations “a hoax and a lie”.
It is the first time Trump has been found legally responsible for a sexual assault.
The Manhattan jury ordered Trump to pay her about $5 million in damages.
The jury of six men and three women reached their decision after less than three hours of deliberations on Tuesday.
“Today, the world finally knows the truth,” Carroll said in a written statement following the verdict. “This victory is not just for me but for every woman who has suffered because she was not believed.”
Trump;s lawyer said the former president plans to appeal against the decision.
Because the trial was in civil court rather than criminal, Trump will not be required to register as a sex offender.
The former president – who has denied Carroll’s accusations – did not attend the two-week civil trial in the Manhattan federal court.
Carroll, 79, held the hands of both her lawyers as the verdict was read in court and smiled as she was awarded damages by the jury.
Trump’s lawyer, Joe Tacopina, shook her hand as the trial ended, telling her: “Congratulations and good luck.”
Roberta Kaplan, a lawyer for the plaintiff said in a statement: “This is a victory not only for E Jean Carroll, but for democracy itself, and for all survivors everywhere.”
After the verdict, Trump, 76, posted on his social media platform Truth Social in all capital letters: “I have absolutely no idea who this woman is. This verdict is a disgrace – a continuation of the greatest witch hunt of all time!”
The standard of proof in civil cases is lower than in criminal cases, meaning that jurors were only required to find that it was more likely than not that Trump assaulted Carroll.
While the jury found Trump liable for sexual battery and defamation of Carroll, they did not find Trump liable of raping her. To do so, the jury would have needed to have been convinced that Trump had engaged in non-consensual sexual intercourse with Carroll.
The trial saw a tense cross-examination between Carroll and Trump’s attorneys.
Her legal team called 11 witnesses to corroborate her claims that Trump had assaulted her in the lingerie department of the luxury store in 1995 or 1996.
They included two women who also say they were sexually assaulted by Trump decades ago. One woman told jurors that Trump groped her during a flight in the 1970s. Another woman said that Trump had forcibly kissed her while she was interviewing him for an article she was writing in 2005.
Two long-time friends of Carroll testified that she told them about the encounter shortly after it occurred. (BBC)
