On Friday, a video clip was published in which former US President Donald Trump testified in a case in which a journalist accuses him of rape in the 1990s. The media began circulating the video after a jury had reviewed it Thursday.
In the 48-minute video, Trump appears wearing a blue tie, a white shirt and a dark jacket, and he defended himself, sometimes in a harsh tone, while answering questions from the plaintiff’s lawyer, journalist E. Jane Carroll.
“I think she’s sick and mentally disturbed.”
Trump had been absent from the civil trial in New York in this case, but the jury was shown Thursday previous testimony he gave in this video, in which he strongly denies the alleged facts.
And the former president confirmed in the video, which was recorded while giving his statement in October 2022, “She is a liar and sick… I think she is sick and suffers from mental disorders.”
In view of his absence and the impossibility of questioning him, the plaintiff’s lawyers requested journalist E. Gene Carroll broadcast lengthy video excerpts during the court hearing.
In this civil case, a jury of nine citizens will decide whether the former president should pay damages to Jane Carroll, who since 2019 accuses him of raping her in the spring of 1996 in the fitting room of a New York department store and then defaming her by claiming that she was lying.
During his testimony, Trump reiterated that he did not know Jane Carroll, who was then a columnist for Elle magazine, and repeatedly stressed that she was “not his type.”
Then I showed him a picture taken during a social evening in which he was present with Jane Carroll years before the alleged meeting in 1996.
Trump confirmed that he did not remember the incident, and thought that Jane Carroll in the picture was his ex-wife, Marla, “She is my wife … She is Marla,” and immediately his lawyer tells him, “It is (EJane) Carroll.”
More than 20 women have accused Trump of sexual harassment or assault
On Thursday, the jury was able to watch a widely circulated video clip in which Trump says in 2005 degrading things to women.
In the video, Trump boasted of kissing and touching them as he pleased, saying, “When you’re a star, women let you do that. You can do anything with them.”
“It’s really old news,” he said during his testimony, stressing that it was “conversations in the dressing room” or “the way the general public speaks.”
According to US media, Trump has been accused in the past by more than 20 women of sexually assaulting or inappropriate behavior towards them. He denied the accusations and was never prosecuted.
However, a new law that became effective in New York as of November gives rape victims the right to sue even if decades have passed since the sexual assault.
