Jury in New York City backs Trump accuser

FPI / May 10, 2023

A New York jury on Monday found former President Donald Trump liable for battery and defamation in the E. Jean Carroll case.

The jury found that Trump did not rape Carroll but sexually abused her.

Carroll alleged that Trump defamed her in a 2022 Truth Social post by calling her allegations "a Hoax and a lie" and saying "This woman is not my type!" when he denied her claim that Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the 1990s.

The jury reached its verdict after just under three hours of deliberations.

The jury awarded Carroll a total of $5 million, including $2 million in compensatory damages, $1 million in damages, $1.7 million for reputation repair, $280,000 in punitive damages for defamation, and $20,000 in punitive damages for battery.

In a Truth Social post, Trump called the verdict a disgrace: "I HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHO THIS WOMAN IS. THIS VERDICT IS A DISGRACE - A CONTINUATION OF THE GREATEST WITCH HUNT OF ALL TIME!"

Before jury deliberations started, he posted: "Waiting for a jury decision on a False Accusation where I, despite being a current political candidate and leading all others in both parties, am not allowed to speak or defend myself, even as hard nosed reporters scream questions about this case at me. In the meantime, the other side has a book falsely accusing me of Rape, & is working with the press. I will therefore not speak until after the trial, but will appeal the Unconstitutional silencing of me, as a candidate, no matter the outcome."

During the trial, Carroll could not pinpoint the date that she alleges Trump attacked her, which she estimated was sometime around 1996.

"And why is there no date to an event as significant as this in someone's life?" defense attorney Joe Tacopina countered. "It's not a coincidence. With no date, no month, no year, you can't present an alibi."

It was revealed last month that Carroll's defense was funded in part by American Future Republic, a social welfare organization funded by Democrat Party megadonor Reid Hoffman, the co-founder of LinkedIn.

The Wall Street Journal reported last month that Hoffman visited Jeffrey Epstein’s "pedophile island" and had plans to stay at Epstein’s notorious Manhattan townhouse in 2014.

Documents obtained by the Journal also detailed Hoffman’s plans to stay the night in Epstein’s townhouse following a late-night flight to Manhattan on Dec. 4, 2014. In the morning, the venture capitalist planned to attend a “breakfast party” where the likes of Epstein and Bill Gates were scheduled to be in attendance.

Hoffman, who’s now worth $2 billion, confirmed to the Journal that his last interaction with Epstein was in 2015. That year, he invited Epstein to a dinner in Palo Alto with Silicon Valley heads.

“It gnaws me that, by lending my association, I helped his reputation, and thus delayed justice for his survivors,” he wrote in an email to the Journal.

Conservative commentator Jack Posobiec noted in a Telegram post: "Democrat megadonor Reid Hoffman is paying E Jean Carroll's legal bills to sue Trump. Reid Hoffman was recently outed as visiting Epstein Island. No media coverage. Why is that?"

Free Press International
[Freedom Is Not Free!]