Judge rebukes Trump's lawyers early and often in sexual assault and defamation trialDuring the first two days of testimony in the civil battery and defamation lawsuit filed against former President Donald Trump, U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan repeatedly rebuked Trump’s lawyers.
The lawsuit, which was brought by magazine columnist and author E. Jean Carroll, involves her claim that Trump raped her in a dressing room at Bergdorf Goodman department store in Manhattan in the mid-1990s then defamed her by calling the accusation a lie.
“I’m here because Donald Trump raped me, and when I wrote about it he said it didn’t happen,” Carroll testified Wednesday at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan U.S. Courthouse in Lower Manhattan. “He lied and shattered my reputation and I’m here to try to get my life back.”
Trump has repeatedly claimed he never met Carroll (despite having been photographed with her and her then husband at a party in the late ’80s), and crassly asserted that she was “not my type.” In court, his lawyers have sought to paint Carroll as inconsistent and unreliable, suggesting her decisions to publicly accuse, and then sue, the former president were motivated by a desire to sell books and “settle a political score.”
On Wednesday, Carroll was the second witness to take the stand. The first, Cheryl Beall, a former Bergdorf Goodman manager, testified about the layout of the store’s sixth floor, where Carroll says the alleged assault occurred. Beall also told the jury that dressing rooms could have been left open and unattended at the time of the alleged sexual attack.
A former talk show host and writer for “Saturday Night Live,” Carroll elicited a few laughs from the judge and others in the courtroom throughout her sometimes-tearful two days of testimony, during which she described in excruciating detail the alleged assault by Trump, her decision to finally come forward after more than 20 years, and the “wave of slime” she said she received from strangers online after Trump called her a liar.
She also acknowledged that her recollection of some specific details about the attack, including the precise timing of when it occurred, is shaky.
“The date has just been something that I am constantly trying to pin down,” she said. “It’s very difficult.”
The trial is expected to last at least another week and the defense will continue its cross-examination of Carroll on Monday morning. Trump is not legally obligated to attend the trial, but his attorneys have left open the possibility that he may do so. In the meantime, he has already weighed in from the sidelines — prompting one of several rebukes that his attorneys, and in particular lead lawyer Joe Tacopina, have already received from the judge.................
https://www.yahoo.com/news/judge-rebukes-trumps-lawyers-early-and-often-in-sexual-assault-and-defamation-trial-004349710.html
