NY. The judge threatened Wednesday to throw Donald Trump out of court in New York after the former president repeatedly ignored orders to remain silent while columnist E. Jean Carroll testified that Trump ruined her reputation after she accused him of sexual abuse.
Judge Lewis A. Kaplan told Trump that his right to be on the court could be revoked if he continues to disrupt the proceedings. After an initial warning, one of the columnist’s lawyers said Trump continued to make comments to his lawyers such as “this is a witch hunt” and “this really is a fraud.”
“Mr. Trump, I hope I don’t have to consider excluding you from the trial,” the judge declared after the jury was allowed to leave for lunch, adding: “I understand that you probably want me to do that.”
“I would love to,” Trump snapped, shrugging as he sat between his attorneys Alina Habba and Michael Madaio at the defense table.
“I know you would love it. You just can’t control yourself under these circumstances, apparently,” Kaplan responded.
“Neither are you,” Trump muttered.
Kaplan made his statement after Carroll’s attorney, Shawn Crowley, complained for a second time that Trump could be heard “saying things out loud that are false” from the defense table, often leaning back in front of him. his chair or approaching his lawyers to talk to them.
Among the comments, Crowley said, were that the columnist was lying about the sexual assault and that “it seems like she suddenly regained her memory.” Crowley suggested that if Carroll’s lawyers could hear Trump where they were sitting, about 12 feet (3.7 meters) from Trump, the jury could hear him too.
“I’m simply going to ask that Mr. Trump take extra care to keep his voice down when conferring with his attorneys, to make sure the jury can’t hear him,” Kaplan said after the jury returned from a morning recess.
Shortly before, when the jury was not in the room, Trump was seen banging the table and uttering the word “Man!”, when the judge again rejected Trump’s lawyer’s request that Thursday’s hearing be canceled so that Trump can attend his mother-in-law’s funeral in Florida.
Carroll, 80, was the first witness in the process, which will determine what compensation Trump should pay for comments he made when he was president, in June 2019, in which he emphatically denied having raped her or even having met her. Last year a jury ruled that Trump did sexually abuse her in 1996 and defamed her when he denied what happened on several occasions in October 2022.
Carroll’s appearance, which will continue Wednesday afternoon, was tense due to restrictions the judge has imposed in light of the previous ruling and previous decisions to restrict political content in the courtroom.
2024-01-17 18:22:00
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