E. Jean Carroll's lawsuits against Trump for Sexual Assault and Defamation

[N.E. Brigand]

Back to the actual topic of this thread. Two new developments. First,

@johnson_carrie
NEW: The Justice Department tells a NY judge it has reversed its position due to legal developments & new facts, and says it has determined former President Trump was *not* acting within the scope of his office when he made statements that allegedly defamed E. Jean Carroll.

To me it feels like both determinations by the Department of Justice are phony.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Can you say more about why you believe that?

[N.E. Brigand]

I admit I was being curmudgeonly. I feel that both filings were written to achieve a particular goal. In the first instance, I think they could have argued it either way, but DOJ was being pressured to get President Trump off the hook, so they wrote it with that result in mind. This time, they knew perfectly well what happened before, but they couldn't just admit to that and say "sorry," so they had to rely on all the nonsense Trump has said since leaving office. Which certainly made it easier for them.

It reminds me of how one of the contributors to the original 1973 OLC opinion on whether a sitting president could or could not be charged with a crime -- the answer they came up with was no -- said that the opinion actually was written with the goal of making it possible, if necessary, to charge a sitting vice president with a crime (because the Dept. of Justice thought it was increasingly likely that they'd be faced with that possibility as regards Spiro Agnew). And the way to do that was to contrast the responsibilities of the vice president with those of the president.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

The legal losses keep piling up for Mr. Trump.

Harry Litman
@harrylitman
Judge Kaplan as expected denied Trump's motion to throw out verdict in Carroll II based on brazen and legally irrelevant claim that jury didn't find Trump raped her. But the reasoning is noteworthy: he finds that Trump DID rape her and jury so found in common usage of rape:

Kaplan: the verdict does "not mean that she failed to prove that Mr. Trump “raped” her as many people commonly understand the word “rape.” Indeed, as the evidence at trial recounted below makes clear, the jury found that Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that." So now we have a judicial determination on the facts--ie based on his construction of verdict -- that Trump is in fact a rapist, akin to or even stronger than other judicial determinations that he committed fraud. That's what he gets for bringing ridiculous motion. Man is he getting clobbered.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Judge Kaplan has granted Carroll's motion to dismiss Trump's ridiculous counterclaim.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Meanwhile, Carroll has moved for summary judgement with regard to liability on her claims, arguing that since the first jury already found that her allegations against Trump that he sexually assaulted her were true, his other statements were defamatory as a matter of law, and that the only issue that should be litigated at trial is how much damages she is entitled to. I think she has a good chance of prevailing on this.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

[Voronwë the Faithful]

[N.E. Brigand]

Donald Trump today posted on his social media network that his sexual assault of E. Jean Carroll, for which he was found financially liable by a jury, is a "made-up fairy tale." I can only guess that he wants to pay her even more than the $5.5 million he already has paid* and whatever he's going to have to pay following his second such trial next year for further defaming her (in which the judge has already ruled that the facts of the case are settled and only the amount of damages are to be determined by a jury).

*Regarding that $5.5 million, it's actually in an attorney escrow fund for the moment: see also the "Russia investigations" thread.

[N.E. Brigand]

"Trump made 47 social media posts today about E. Jean Carroll."

[N.E. Brigand]

This post is from the Russia-and-other-investigations thread but now is relevant here:

I had not heard until today that Melania Trump's mother, Amalija Knavs, passed away Tuesday in Miami at the age 78. May she rest in peace. I had vaguely heard something about Melania not being at her husband's New Year's Eve event; it turns out that the reason is that she was visiting her mother in the hospital.

(I learned this because Rep. Claudia Tenney, Republican of New York, wrote that it was "contemptible" for Judge Engoron to proceed with today's closing arguments rather than let Donald Trump be with his grieving wife. But I hadn't heard that Trump asked for a delay. And as others have noted, Trump was not required to attend today's closing arguments, and he's been to several campaign events yesterday and today.)

Yesterday, we learned that Donald Trump did file in the second E. Jean Carroll case (which is actually the first case: this is the defamation trial that was delayed so long while various judges considered whether or not Trump was acting within his official duties as president when he smeared Carroll in 2019) asking the judge to delay this trial by a week -- it's been scheduled to start this Tuesday (Jan. 16th) -- so that he could travel Tuesday and Wednesday to attend his mother-in-law's funeral. Judge Kaplan said no. Trump isn't required to attend this civil trial in person (and he wasn't in Kaplan's courtroom much (or at all?) during the previous Carroll case), and the trial will proceed as scheduled. Naturally Trump used this as an occasion to play the victim again on social media, writing:

Crazed, Trump hating Judge, Lewis Kaplan, who presided over the Election Interference Witch Hunt, disguised as a trial, of a woman I have never met before (celebrity photo line does not count - I had no idea who she was!), was asked if he could delay this Rigged Political Scam for one day so that I could attend the FUNERAL OF MY BELOVED MOTHER-IN-LAW WITH MY WIFE, THE FORMER (AND NEXT!) FIRST LADY OF THE UNITED STATES — AND HE SAID NO. He is a bad person and an even worse Judge. Appointed by, and friends with, Clinton, he purposely scheduled this HOAX right in the middle of the important New Hampshire Primary. This is the second trial concerning the same person, who is represented and financed by POLITICAL OPERATIVES. It could have taken place at any time, including months ago. Can anyone imagine a husband not going to his wife’s mother’s funeral over a MADE UP STORY - A story that has been allowed to simmer by a really bad Judge who suffers from TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME!

The bit about Trump claiming he didn't recognize Carroll actually ended up being used against him in the previous trial, because it turned out that in a deposition, when shown the picture of Carroll and himself in that photo line, he said that the picture showed him and his then-wife, Marla Maples, which was super ironic because when Carroll went public in 2019 with the news about Trump having raped her, he said Carroll wasn't his "type".

But more to the point for the motion that Judge Kaplan denied yesterday: Carroll's lawyers have filed today to inform Kaplan that, despite Trump claiming he wanted to postpone the trial to attend Mrs. Knavs's funeral on Tuesday and Wednesday, he has a campaign event scheduled in New Hampshire on Wednesday.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

And yet he will continue to play the victim card. And you are quite correct; he did not attend a second of the first trial (Carroll II). And if he were to attend or testify in either trial, that was the one to do so in, since the issue of liability was decided in that case and the judge has banned any argument or testify contradicting the conclusion in the first trial that he did sexually assault Carroll. If Trump does testify in this case, it is 100% certain (to me at least) that he will violate that order, and I doubt that Judge Kaplan will be as tolerant as Judge Engoron was.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

On that note:

[RoseMorninStar]

I've often wondered how Trump can convince so many he is a 'winner' when he's such a whiner. Winners don't constantly whine 'poor me, I'm a victim'.

[N.E. Brigand]

In the E. Jean Carroll proceedings today, Judge Kaplan explained to prospective jurors that "it has been determined already that Mr. Trump did sexually assault Ms. Carroll, that he knew when he made the statements about Ms. Carroll that the statements were false, that he made them with reckless disregard to whether they were true or false".

[Voronwë the Faithful]

After a break there will be opening arguments. Testimony will not begin until tomorrow.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

This is just bizarre.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

It is impossible for me to overstate how inappropriate this conduct is [eta: by Habba, not Judge Kaplan, in case I was not clear]

[Voronwë the Faithful]

This is just ... I can't even ... .

[N.E. Brigand]

Donald Trump's right hand today appeared to have several bloody welts on it there were not there yesterday. There is speculation that this could represent something more serious, but it's probably just that he fell overnight and doesn't want to admit it.