NEW YORK, NY– A jury has found Donald Trump liable in the 1996 sexual abuse case filed by E. Jean Carroll.
The verdict was reached Tuesday during the first day of deliberations in a federal courtroom in New York City.
Carroll, an advice columnist, went public in 2019 with her allegation that Trump raped her in the dressing room of a store in Manhattan in 1996.
Carroll reported that she had a chance encounter with Trump at the store across the street from Trump Tower, where they teased each other about trying on a piece of lingerie. Carroll says Trump eventually became violent with her inside a dressing room.
Trump denied the allegations calling Carroll a “nut job,” whom he neither knew nor ever encountered and said that she made up “a fraudulent and false story” to sell her memoir.
Carroll eventually filed a lawsuit seeking unspecified damages and a retraction to Trump’s claims against her.
Two of Carroll’s friends told the jury that Carroll told them about the incident right after it occurred, though she did not report it to the authorities.
Carroll’s attorney also pointed to the 2005 “Access Hollywood” video where Trump claimed that celebrities can grab women without asking.
While jurors did not believe Carroll had been raped by Trump, they did find Trump liable for sexual abuse and for defaming Carroll after she went public.
Carroll was awarded a judgment of $5 million.
After the verdict was reached, Trump took to his social media calling the verdict “a disgrace” and “a continuation of the greatest witch hunt of all time.”