A federal judge on Wednesday ordered that writer E. Jean Carroll, who accused Donald Trump of sexually assaulting and then defaming her, receive the $5 million the US president was ordered to pay her in a civil suit.
• Also read: Supreme Court rejects Trump’s appeal: he must pay $5 million to E. Jean Carroll
Last week, the United States Supreme Court refused to consider Donald Trump’s appeal against a May 2023 judgment, condemning him to two million dollars in damages for sexual assault and three million for defamatory remarks.
In this case, the former journalist and columnist, now 82 years old, accuses the president of having attacked her in a fitting room of a New York department store in 1996.
When these allegations were made public, during a book published in 2019, the Republican billionaire called her “crazy” having set up a “phony business”.
By refusing to examine the appeal, the Supreme Court rendered the final judgment.
On Wednesday, Federal Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered the payment to E. Jean Carroll of the $5 million that Donald Trump had been forced to deposit in court to guarantee payment of his conviction once the appeal procedures had been exhausted.
The judgment also provides for the payment of accrued interest, without specifying the amount.
In another defamation proceeding in New York, Mr. Trump was ordered to pay Ms. Carroll $83.3 million. This conviction was confirmed on appeal, but its execution remains suspended pending the Supreme Court’s decision on a possible referral.
At the end of May, American media reported that the journalist was herself the subject of a criminal investigation, presented as a new example of the president’s desire to use justice against his enemies.
This investigation, opened by prosecutors from the Department of Justice, aims to determine whether Ms. Carroll lied under oath during several depositions against Donald Trump, indicated CNN and the New York Timesciting sources close to the matter.
