Talk:E. Jean Carroll v. Donald J. Trump

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Carroll and uncertainty

This edit says Carroll was uncertain about what penetrated her, and deletes that she alleged the defendant’s penis penetrated her. I do not see any support in the cited sources for those changes. Anythingyouwant (talk) 03:51, 16 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It seems partially correct? Seem to remember reading her saying he might have grabbed her cat first. She then surmised what penetrated her based on what she allegedly felt, not saw, hence some uncertainty. UpdateNerd (talk) 04:02, 16 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Source? Anythingyouwant (talk) 05:07, 16 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I’ll go ahead and insert these sources:

Hymes, Clare and Kates, Graham. “Trump liable for sexual abuse, defamation; ordered to pay E. Jean Carroll $5 million”, CBS News (May 9, 2023): “She said Trump forcefully penetrated her with his hand, causing severe pain, and then penetrated her with his penis.”
Orden, Erica. “‘I’m here because Donald Trump raped me,’ Carroll says on witness stand”, Politico (April 26, 2023): “‘Then he inserted his penis,’ she said….”
Weiser, Benjamin et al. ”In Searing Detail, Trump’s Accuser Tells Her Story”, New York Times (April 26, 2023): “Then, she said, he inserted his penis.” Anythingyouwant (talk) 05:28, 16 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

"Falsely stated"??

LEAD: In December 2024, Trump settled a defamation case with ABC News after anchor George Stephanopoulos falsely stated that Trump was found liable of rape in the case.^[1]

BODY: In March 2024, George Stephanopoulos of ABC News repeatedly made false statements that Trump was found liable for rape.^[1]

Yes, the BBC source says so, but other RS are complaining about ABC's settlement with Trump because what Stephanopoulos said, like this article, was correct. They agree with the judge.

ABC should not have settled. The BBC is wrong, the other sources this article uses are correct, and a legal settlement (especially a political one in the face of threats from an incoming president) is not the only determinant of truth, so what do we do? Do we do a "both sides say" thing? This is confusing. We have an obvious conflict between the BBC and the other sources this article uses.

I dispute the way we mention this. We should not take the side of the BBC (especially in the lead) over other sources or the lawsuit. The matter is more complicated. I think we should find some sort of Solomonic solution. We use the word "inaccurate" to describe his statements. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:00, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Associated Press says “wrongly claimed”. Anythingyouwant (talk) 04:13, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That wording is preferable to "falsely". The timing of all this is important, as later wordings from the judge may make a difference. If the suit was filed before the judge's statements favoring "rape", then we should not take the previous reasoning without considering the later wordings. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 04:32, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Okay by me. Anythingyouwant (talk) 04:36, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry, I edited the article [1] before I saw that there was a discussion going on. I don't mean to assume consensus. _signed,Willondon (talk) 16:24, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Judge Kaplan's full statement affirms that Trump was not found liable for rape and goes on to argue for a broader colloquial understanding of the term in which there was "rape". Any claims that Trump was found liable for rape are false. Stephanopoulos claimed Trump was, ergo, that is a false claim. In addition to the BBC, the Washington Post similarly uses the term "false". Is there any RS that actually says Stephanopoulos was correct in claiming Trump was found liable for rape?

But, "incorrectly" or "false" doesn't really matter, they're synonymous. Either way, RS are clear that the claims are false/incorrect/wrong/inaccurate, and that should belong in the article as other false claims are presented on this website, as shown by the hyperlinked "False or misleading statements by Donald Trump" article just below the lead in the Background section. KiharaNoukan (talk) 17:50, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

KiharaNoukan, your use of italics for "found liable" seems to imply something. What is your point? Are you disagreeing with this content in our lead?:

In July 2023, Judge Kaplan said that the verdict found that Trump had raped Carroll according to the common definition of the word, i.e. not necessarily implying penile penetration.^[a]^[b] In August 2023, Kaplan dismissed a countersuit and wrote that Carroll's accusation of rape is "substantially true".

Is there something wrong with that wording? According to that, it seems that Stephanopoulos was right, hence all the disagreement with ABC's decision to settle, rather than to force Trump to go to court and speak. Maybe you see some semantic or legal point I am not seeing, so please explain.

"Judge Kaplan said that the verdict found that Trump had raped Carroll according to the common definition of the word"

To me, "verdict found" (Kaplan) and "found liable" (Stephanopoulos) are essentially synonymous, showing that they agree, but I am not a lawyer.

"Carroll's accusation of rape is "substantially true"." (Kaplan) If Carroll and Stephanopoulos agreed, and Kaplan said that Carroll was right, then Stephanopoulos was also right.

Another possible point of contention might be between the jury and the judge. Are you trying to point out that they are at odds with each other? I'm just trying to show that there are several ways this can be a complicated, not a simple, matter. Because this ABC lawsuit matter is a political, not strictly legal, matter, we need to find ways to word this with enough elasticity to encompass more than just one angle. We have Carroll, Kaplan, and Stephanopoulos on one side, in agreement, against Trump and his lawyers, and ABC caved! WTF?? As one RS put it, ABC put "blood in the water," and Trump will now use this as a precedent to hunt down all other media sources of criticism. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 19:52, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

It's to highlight the difference between what Judge Kaplan is saying in that lead content (statement on the colloquial understanding of the term) vs what Stephanopoulos said (statement on what the jury decided Carroll had proven with preponderance of the evidence). RS like the BBC and Washington Post are not wrong to say Stephanopoulos's statements are false, they're a focused reading of what he specifically said, which is about what Trump was found liable for by a jury. "Found liable" is basically the civil case equivalent for saying that someone was convicted in a criminal case. The jury's verdict did not include what Stephanopoulos said happened, so he is wrong.

Judge Kaplan himself explains the difference in his full statement: The finding that Ms. Carroll failed to prove that she was “raped” within the meaning of the New York Penal Law does not mean that she failed to prove that Mr. Trump “raped” her as many people commonly understand the word “rape.” (emphasis mine) Stephanopoulos was talking about the finding in the case, he got it wrong/false/incorrect by saying Trump was found liable, which would entail Carroll proving her claim of rape before the jury.

Judge Altonaga, from the ABC defamation case, lays this out clearly and comments on how Kaplan's statements weigh on the case: “New York has opted to separate out a crime of rape. Stephanopoulos’s statements dealt not with the public’s usage of that term, but the jury’s consideration of it during a formal legal proceeding,” Altonaga wrote, adding that this case would turn on “whether it is substantially true to say a jury (or juries) found (Trump) liable for rape by a jury despite the jury’s verdict expressly finding he was not liable for rape.”

“Judge Kaplan was reviewing a jury’s damages award. His analysis necessarily focused on what Carroll had and had not proved at trial, as well as the harm Carroll experienced from (Trump’s) abuse. There was no discussion of how to accurately report on the jury’s findings.” KiharaNoukan (talk) 01:01, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

KiharaNoukan, thanks so much for the good reply. Somehow we need to improve and delimit what happened. We could do that by separating what was said/found by (1) the jury, (2) Kaplan, (3) Carroll, and (4) Stephanopoulos from each other. Blending them creates a muddled mess. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:33, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Let's be careful here. ABC settles the case. Well, it was a tax-deductible donation to the presidential library so they basically settled it for free. A settlement in legal terms usually does not change the fact pattern of other cases or admit anything. A settlement is legally and factually moot, usually. It's a tactic to "make it go away" without adjudicating any issues. We shouldn't extrapolate that the settlement indicates anything was true or false or take any sides based on the settlement. Earlier statements of fact and cases still apply inasmuch as reliable sources and reliable experts have weighed in on the fact patterns of the case. IANAL, of course, but be careful about reading between the lines in such matters. Andre🚐 20:08, 17 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
- Thanks Andre. That is exactly what we need to keep in mind. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 02:35, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

404 Media does not say that Stephanopoulos was wrong when describing Trump v. ABC: That case—in which George Stephanopoulos said that Trump was found civilly liable of "rape" rather than of "sexual assault"—has scared the shit out of media companies. I also worry that the RSes are describing it as strictly false out of pressure from Trump. But there's no RS that I have read yet that describes it that way. SWinxy (talk) 13:24, 20 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ ^a ^b "Trump gets $15m in ABC News defamation case". BBC. 14 December 2024.
^ Cite error: The named reference memo was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^ Cite error: The named reference blake was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^ Cite error: The named reference mark was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^ Cite error: The named reference exp was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

^ New York Penal Law defines rape as vaginal penetration by the penis, which Carroll stated perhaps entered only "halfway".^[2]^[3]^[4]
^ A state law passed in late January 2024 expanded the state's legal definition of rape to include nonconsensual vaginal, anal, and oral contact, effective non-retroactively beginning in September 2024.^[5]

Incorrect Use of Terms Suggesting this was a criminal case.

The article states "Regarding the jury verdict, the judge asked the jury to find if the preponderance of the evidence suggested that Trump raped Carroll under New York's narrow legal definition of rape at that time, defining rape as forcible penetration with the penis, as alleged by the plaintiff, but the jury did not find Trump guilty of rape using that narrow meaning of the word and instead found him guilty on the reduced charge of sexual abuse. This was a civil case and there is no finding of "guilt" or "innocence" as part of the court proceedings. There was no possibility of conviction and there was no charge of crime. 152.117.104.147 (talk) 15:04, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Good catch. I see that it has been fixed. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:21, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

This brings up an issue. We need to prominently label which trials are civil and which are criminal. -- Valjean (talk) (PING me) 20:27, 18 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]

[bbcdec14-1] "Trump gets $15m in ABC News defamation case". BBC. 14 December 2024.

[memo-2] Cite error: The named reference memo was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[blake-3] Cite error: The named reference blake was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[mark-4] Cite error: The named reference mark was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[exp-6] Cite error: The named reference exp was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[def-5] New York Penal Law defines rape as vaginal penetration by the penis, which Carroll stated perhaps entered only "halfway".^[2]^[3]^[4]

[law-7] A state law passed in late January 2024 expanded the state's legal definition of rape to include nonconsensual vaginal, anal, and oral contact, effective non-retroactively beginning in September 2024.^[5]

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