E. Jean Carroll at her home in Warwick, NY. Carroll claims that Donald Trump sexually assaulted her in a dressing room at a Manhattan department store within the mid-Nineties. Trump denies knowing Carroll.(Photo by Eva Deitch for The Washington Post via Getty Images)
Eva Deitch | The Washington Post | Getty Images
A author who accused former President Donald Trump of rape filed an upgraded lawsuit against him Thursday in Recent York, minutes after a latest state law took effect allowing victims of sexual violence to sue over attacks that occurred many years 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. She sought unspecified compensatory and punitive damages for pain and suffering, psychological harms, dignity loss and fame damage.
Carroll, a longtime advice columnist for Elle magazine, first made the claim in a 2019 book, saying Trump raped her within the dressing room of a Manhattan luxury department store in 1995 or 1996.
Trump responded to the book’s allegations by saying it could never have happened because Carroll was “not my type.”
His remarks led Carroll to file a defamation lawsuit against him, but that lawsuit has been tied up in appeals courts as judges resolve whether he’s shielded from legal claims for comments made while he was president.
Previously, Carroll had been barred by state law from suing over the alleged rape because too a few years had passed for the reason that incident.
Recent York’s latest law, nonetheless, gives sex crime victims who missed deadlines related to statute of limitations a second likelihood to file a lawsuit. A window for such suits will open for one yr, after which the same old closing dates shall be reinstated.
No less than a whole lot of lawsuits are expected, including many filed by women who say they were assaulted by co-workers, prison guards, medical providers or others.
In her latest claims, Carroll maintains that Trump committed battery “when he forcibly raped and groped her” and that he defamed her when he denied raping her last month.
Trump said in his statement that Carroll “completely made up a story that I met her on the doors of this crowded Recent York City Department Store and, inside minutes, ‘swooned’ her. It’s a Hoax and a lie, similar to all the opposite Hoaxes which were played on me for the past seven years.”
Former President Donald Trump gets able to speak during a Save America rally on October 1, 2022 in Warren, Michigan.
Emily Elconin | Getty Images
Carroll’s latest ability to sue Trump for rape could help her sidestep a potentially fatal legal flaw in her original defamation case.
If the courts ultimately hold that Trump’s original disparaging comments about Carroll’s rape allegation were a part of his job duties, as president, she could be barred from suing him over those remarks, as federal employees are shielded from defamation claims. No such protection would cover things he did prior to becoming president.
Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, who presides over the defamation lawsuit Carroll filed three years ago, may resolve to incorporate the brand new claims in a trial more likely to occur within the spring.
Trump’s current lawyers said this week that they don’t yet know whether they’ll represent him against the brand new allegations.
Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, who shouldn’t be related to the judge, said at a court hearing this week that the brand new claims shouldn’t require much additional gathering of evidence. She already put a replica of the brand new claims in the unique case file last week. Trump and Carroll even have already been deposed.
E. Jean Carroll sits alongside lawyers Joshua Matz and Marcella Coburn during a hearing in her defamation lawsuit against U.S. President Donald Trump at a courthouse in Recent York, October 21, 2020 on this courtroom sketch.
Jane Rosenberg | Reuters
In an announcement regarding the brand new lawsuit, Kaplan said her client “intends to carry Donald Trump accountable not just for defaming her, but additionally for sexually assaulting her, which he did years ago in a dressing room at Bergdorf Goodman.”
“Thanksgiving Day was the very first day Ms. Carroll could file under Recent York law so our criticism was filed with the court shortly after midnight,” she added.
Attorney Michael Madaio, a lawyer for Trump, said on the hearing that the brand new allegations are significantly different than the unique defamation lawsuit and would require “a wholly latest set” of evidence gathering.
A lawyer for Trump didn’t reply to a message looking for comment on Wednesday. One other message looking for comment was sent to the lawyer after the lawsuit was filed lower than 10 minutes into the brand new day.
