New York, Apr 25 (EFE).- The civil trial for defamation and rape against former US President Donald Trump began today in New York with the selection of the jury, local media reported.
Trump is accused of defamation and rape by the writer and journalist E. Jean Carroll, who attended the first session of the process, unlike Trump, whose lawyers alleged the “logistical and financial burdens” that his displacement would cause the city.
Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, who offered Trump the possibility of not attending the hearings, determined that the jury remain anonymous, even for the lawyers of the parties, given the possibility that they suffer some type of harassment or attack by some of Trump’s supporters.
The process is carried out by civil means, so the former president does not face a possible prison sentence, but he could be forced to pay significant compensation if found guilty.
In addition, it would be the first time that Trump has faced legal consequences for alleged sexual assault or abuse, after dozens of women have accused him over the years.
Carroll denounced in 2019, when Trump was still president, that 25 years ago the then-businessman cornered her in a changing room of a New York department store and raped her, facts that she recounted to two friends -called to testify in the case- but who He did not report to the police.
When making the complaint known, Trump disqualified her saying that she was not his “type”, that all this was “a joke and a lie” and that what she was looking for was free fame to promote a book, among other statements that motivated Carroll’s complaint for defamation.
Trump’s legal team has tried to delay the opening of the new case by presenting several requests to Judge Kaplan, the last of them alleging that a period of “calm” was needed to be able to objectively choose the jury, but the judge has stopped all these attempts. .
