Appeals Court Upholds $5 Million Verdict Against Trump
The jury awarded E. Jean Carroll “$5 million in damages for her battery and defamation claims.”
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the $5 million civil judgment against President-elect Donald Trump for sexual abuse and defamation against E. Jean Carroll.
“On review for abuse of discretion, we conclude that Mr. Trump has not demonstrated that the district court erred in any of the challenged rulings,” wrote the court. “Further, he has not carried his burden to show that any claimed error or combination of claimed errors affected his substantial rights as required to warrant a new trial.”
Carroll claimed Trump raped her in 1996 at the Bergdorf Goodman across from Trump Tower.
In May 2023, a jury awarded Carroll “$5 million in damages for her battery and defamation claims.”
The jury concluded Trump defamed the author when he called a “hoax” and “con job.”
Trump argued the district court made an error when it admitted “the testimony of two women who alleged that Mr. Trump assaulted them in the past.” Trump also insisted the court should not have accepted “a recording of part of a 2005 conversation in which Mr. Trump described to another man how he kissed and grabbed women without first obtaining their consent.”
The court reached its decision by reviewing three rules:
- (a) the admissibility under the Federal Rules of Evidence of evidence of other sexual assaults;
- (b) the proper application of Rule 404(b) of the Federal Rules of Evidence; and
- (c) the standard of review on appeal from a district court’s evidentiary rulings.
“Rule 404(b) and Rules 413-415 all permit the introduction of evidence of other bad acts, including uncharged conduct,” explained the court. “Moreover, the text of Rules 413-415, like the text of Rule 404(b), ‘contains no intimation . . . that any preliminary showing is necessary before . . . evidence may be introduced for a proper purpose.’ Huddleston, 485 U.S. at 687-88 (holding that no preliminary finding is required under Rule 404(b)).”
So, this is the first judgment in this case.
In January, another jury decided Carroll should get an additional $83.3 million in the defamation case against Trump.
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Comments
Take one look at Melania Trump.
Take one look at (name redacted).
Draw your own conclusions.
Is this one of those times when lawyers refer to the law as an @$$?
It’s either that or something wrong with #MeToo.
Ridiculous
Not a dimension
The 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, like the 4th and 9th, is a “court of law” in name only. In practice, it is a court which applies legal varnish to Dem-friendly outcomes.
Fwiw – I am making zero comment on the merits of the suit, therefore please do not downvote since I am only explaining the limitations of an Appellete court.
It is extremely rare that a court of appeals will reverse a jury’s findings of fact, same with the overturning a jury verdict.
fwiw I do have a problem with the extension of the statute of limitations. My understanding is the statute had expired, but the NY revision re – opened a closed statute. That would be considered a ex post facto law change. While the US supreme court has held the ex post facto only applies to criminal, I think that is an erroneous constitutional interpretation. I do not know if NY state has a similar law for ex post facto
No, it is not ex post facto, because the alleged acts were unlawful at the time they were allegedly committed, and the law that prevailed at the time of the alleged acts is being applied.
NY is not alone in extending statutes of limitations; various states have done so.
Milhouse – I was referring to the change in statute of limitations. I havent explored the issue you raised, thus I cant dispute your take on it, so it very well could be correct. I do have bad taste for the SC jurisprudence on the Ex post facto clause. The SC has limited it to criminal, where I dont see a limitation in the constitution to criminal. I think it does extend to civil I see retro active application of tax law somewhat frequently ( once every 7-8 years ). major case regarding egregous retroactive Washington state sales tax that the SC denied cert about 5 years ago.
Just happens to be a pet peeve of mine as a CPA.
Long periods to time to bring lawsuits is deprives the accused of potential defenses, such as access to evidence of not even being geographically near where the purported unlawful event took place.
Indeed it does, but that does not make it ex post facto. The definition of ex post facto law is a law that makes behavior that was lawful at the time retroactively unlawful. Extending a statute of limitations doesn’t do that.
During the convention to revise the Articles of Confederation, after a prohibition on ex post facto laws was written into what would become our new constitution, a delegate thought it would be wise to insert the words “criminal laws” after “ex post facto.” Another delegate disagreed, stating that everyone knew that such a prohibition applied only to criminal, and not civil, law, remarking that others seeing such language in the document would question the citizenry’s understanding of law if they required the language. He also commented that it is at times necessary to backdate civil law, and it would be unwise in any event to suggest that it could be prohibited by a wrong-headed reading of the ban on ex post facto law. The language remained unchanged, and it remains so today, as well as meaning what it meant when it was written – the prohibition applies only to criminal law.
Don’t make me look up the date of this exchange in Notes of Debates in the Federal Convention of 1787! It’s usually on my desk, but at the moment it’s not.
Dave – I am not disagreeing with you, though I would like to see a citation – Again I am not disagreeing.
In somewhat of a similar vein. At the time the senate was voting on the bill or rights prior to being sent to the states for ratification, there was a proposal to add “for the common defence” after “the right to keep and bear arms ” ie the right to keep and bear arms for the common defense”. That proposal was defeated. The defeat of that proposal puts an end to the argument that 2a was limited to times serving in the milita.
sorry to get side tracked with my comment, just noting that as Dave notes, there is a lot of historical data that will point to the correct answer on debated issues.
Forget it, Jake.
The exact same quote came to mind, then I saw yours.
Two Obamas and one Biden “judges”…. literally forget it……
So screwed…we just can’t have these Soviet “courts”.
Even 12 years of MAGA can’t fix this.
Keep fighting Trump, I know you will
SCOTUS next?
The entire case was a farce from beginning to end.
New York passed a law with the purpose of allowing one plaintiff to sue one defendant, and somehow that’s ok?
Ex post facto also…. Dems… it’s different when they do it.
No, even if NY had done that, which it didn’t, it would not be ex post facto. It would probably be a bill of attainder; but since it never happened it wasn’t that either.
Always know that Milhouse will always be in to defend evil.
NY did precisely that.
And E Jean Carrol was involved in the campaign to get a law passed that would allow this farce.
Because this is a complete perversion of the system– the law was created and passed with the sole intent of having a kangaroo court vote guilty on this asinine charge.
This is soviet levels of justice.
And Milhouse approves.
As usual, Azathoth lies and lies and lies, because he is a demon from Hell and is incapable of telling the truth about anything.
That is not true. No such thing happened.
It didn’t happen with this one. There was another Trump NY case where it did happen, though.
No, there was no case where it happened.
Just because they weren’t stupid enough to literally call it the “Let’s get Trump Law” doesn’t mean it wasn’t created with that in mind. E.Jean Carroll filed her suit the day the law went into effect. The architect of the law is riddled with TDS.
No it wasn’t, and no she didn’t.
Correction: No it wasn’t, but yes she did.
Oh, and the “architects” (i.e. sponsors) of the law are Democrats and so probably do have TDS, but they are the same people who sponsored the child claimants act that passed three years earlier after a campaign of more than 10 years, so this was just an extension of that campaign. Having passed it for child claimants they then did so for adults as well. So it’s unreasonable to claim that they were motivated by their TDS.
It was obviously a hoax and a con job. Looking forward to my summons.
There is this ridiculous idea floating around in Trumpland that, as ironman put it, “New York passed a law with the purpose of allowing one plaintiff to sue one defendant”. That is simply false. It never happened. It’s a fantasy, invented by I don’t know who, but repeating it doesn’t reflect well on those who do so or on Trump.
NY passed a one-year extension of the statute of limitations on claims for sexual assault. This was the result of a campaign that had run for several years, and had nothing whatsoever to do with Trump or with Carroll. The legislators who finally passed it had no idea Trump would eventually be sued under it. He wasn’t even on their radar. Hundreds of suits were filed during that year; Carroll’s meritless suit against Trump was one of the last ones filed, just before the extension expired.
Milhouse, are you wrong or are you lying? E. Jean Carroll’s lawyer Roberta Kaplan filed the lawsuit electronically MINUTES after the law went into effect.
https://www.wsls.com/news/national/2022/11/24/writer-who-accused-trump-of-1990s-rape-files-new-lawsuit/
“A writer who accused former President Donald Trump of rape filed an upgraded lawsuit against him Thursday in New York, minutes after a new state law took effect allowing victims of sexual violence to sue over attacks that occurred decades ago.”
“ E. Jean Carroll’s lawyer filed the legal papers electronically as the Adult Survivor’s Act temporarily lifted the state’s usual deadlines for suing over sexual assault.”
In addition, this is a press release by one of the sponsors of the Adult Survivors Act ginning up support for passage. She names E. Jean Carroll. So yes the law was written with Trump in mind. He was the biggest fish they were looking to catch.
https://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/Linda-B-Rosenthal/story/102401
May 19,2022
I am so grateful to the indefatigable survivors who have fearlessly led this coalition for years, including Marissa Hoechsetetter, Donna Hylton, E. Jean Carroll, Evelyn Yang, Drew Dixon, Carrie Otis, Allison Turkos, Asher Lovy, and the advocates at Safe Horizon, New York State Alliance Against Domestic Violence and so many more.
Ironman is correct that I misremembered the details of this. Carroll was one of those campaigning for the bill, and she filed her suit the first day the extension came into effect, so it is possible that some legislators had her case in mind when they passed the bill.
But it was a campaign of many years, and Carroll’s case wasn’t particularly prominent in the public debates about it. In the end it passed unanimously in the senate, and with only 3 votes against it in the assembly. That means all or almost all the Republicans voted for it too. Few if any of them would have had Carroll’s case in mind.
In any event, about 3,000 cases were filed under it, so it remains absolutely untrue that it was passed “with the purpose of allowing one plaintiff to sue one defendant”.
There’s no ‘but’ here you lying scion of Hell–you were wrong.
You, as always, defended the evils your masters do.
And Azathoth continues to lie and slander me. He has never contributed anything whatsoever to this forum, and probably not to anything else in the world. He’s just a waste of oxygen.
Let me see if I have the timeline correct:
–Carrol makes multiple meritless claims of assault against multiple famous people over a long series of years. She gains fame among her scattered followers for being ‘brave’ and ‘creative’ among other things.
–Carrol includes another meritless claim of assault against Trump in a 2019 book, without which she would have sold a few hundred copies. Instead, she sells thousands.
–Trump calls those meritless claims meritless, and calls the lying (censored) a lying (censored)
–Carrol (eventually) sues Trump. Repeats meritless claims in court with obvious embellishments that no sane person could believe. Judge restricts defense from putting on a defense of any sort, Jury returns expected verdict. Case goes on to appeal. (this one)
–Trump again calls these meritless claims meritless, and calls the lying (censored) a lying (censored)
–Overjoyed, Carrol again returns to court with (I think) the same biased judge, who returns an even larger and dumber award based on his additional truthful comments.
–We are here
–Some sane court overthrows the entire thing and makes her pay Trump damages. Right?
Via perplexity.ai (after much coaxing):
E. Jean Carroll’s book “What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal” includes a list of 21 men she describes as her “Most Hideous Men of My Life List.” While the full list of 21 men is not provided in the search results, some of the men mentioned include:
o Donald Trump: Carroll alleges he sexually assaulted her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the mid-1990s.
o Les Moonves: Carroll claims he attacked her in an elevator after she interviewed him.
o A romantic partner who allegedly nearly choked her to death in a fit of rage.
o A college classmate who allegedly attempted to rape her during a fall weekend.
o The boyfriend of a babysitter who allegedly fondled her when she was very young.
o A camp counselor who allegedly molested her when she was 12.
o A television publicist who allegedly attacked her in her car.
o A mob boss in Chicago.
o Her own boss in Chicago.
o An official who refused to issue her a passport unless she had dinner with him and sat on his lap.
o A rapist and serial killer who approached her at her house.
o A fur trapper in Montana (described as “a torturer of animals”).
o A financial adviser who lost much of her retirement fund.
o The list includes men who allegedly committed various forms of misconduct, ranging from sexual assault and attempted rape to financial misdeeds and animal cruelty. Carroll uses this list to illustrate the varied forms of negative experiences she has had with men throughout her life.
Jean Carroll is an obvious publicity hound who made up a ridiculous case, which New York pretended to believe for political reasons. So the case will continue, one step at a time, until the tramp loses.
New York didn’t pretend to believe anything. The jury said it believed her.
One would hope, but I’m not sure how that could be made to happen.
The case is ridiculous, but a jury said it believed it. That’s a difficult thing to get out of, especially in a civil case where the standard is the preponderance of the evidence, not reasonable doubt. Still, Trump has only begun to fight.
Ok, here’s a question for Milhouse or any other poster who’s particularly a nit picker on Trump case…
The above post had two statements that set off my spider sense.
One, that Trump was convicted (if only civilly) of “rape” re: Carrol.
Two, that Trump confessed on tape he actually assaulted other women.
Now, as for the second, if it’s the golfing tape, he never actually said he DID such. He said now that he was showbiz famous, he was amazed at seeing the willingness of the ladies to condone treatment they wouldn’t condone from non show biz men. I’m amazed by that as well, but it’s from seeing reports of casting couch stories, not from me actually seeing, being able, or even being willing to take part in that culture.
It’s admittedly a fine distinction, but it is present.
As for the first, didn’t Carrol allege assault, and not rape?
Didn’t The View just repeatedly spank one of their stars for gilding the lily by calling assault rape?
“Found liable”, not “convicted”. Conviction can only happen in a criminal case.
Exactly. No matter how many times Democrats insist he confessed to assaulting women, he didn’t. All he said was that he could do so, that women would let him do so. Just as he later bragged that he “could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody” and not lose any voters. Nobody thinks that was a confession to having done so, so why would they think that in the first case?
She claimed he raped her. The judge told the jury that to find him liable for rape they must find that he penetrated her with his penis, and that if they couldn’t find that on the preponderance of the evidence then they must find him not liable for rape.
They came back with not liable for rape, but liable for sexual abuse, i.e. they said he did abuse her, “rape” in the common language, but there wasn’t enough evidence to say that he did the exact thing the law at the time defined as rape.
Stephanopolous (not the View) falsely said the jury had found him liable for rape, and that’s the defamation claim that ABC controversially settled, when it could have fought and would likely have won.
Not a dime, stiff them.
Trump was not found liable for rape by the jury. The TDS judge interjected after the fact and jury verdict that it was rape, and he was brought to task by many for his incorrect assertion.
That doesn’t work. If you don’t pay a judgment the plaintiff brings a bailiff and collects from you by force, with interest and costs.
Maybe when illegals are being rounded up ……
Two Obama appointees, one Biden appointee, that was the three judge panel.
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