Trump Testimony in E. Jean Carroll Trial May Be a Catastrophe

• Donald Trump is slated to testify in E. Jean Carroll’s defamation trial towards him.
• The one factor he can do is repent, consultants say. He is extra possible to provide a marketing campaign speech.
• The choose can kick him off the witness stand, a shaming that might encourage an enormous jury verdict.

The primary time E. Jean Carroll took Donald Trump to courtroom, he did not even present up.

Trump did not attend a single day of his trial in Manhattan federal courtroom final yr. The jury finally agreed with Carroll’s allegations — that Trump sexually abused and defamed her — and advised him to pay $5 million in damages.

Lower than a yr later, Trump is standing trial once more for defaming Carroll.

As a result of a jury already discovered him liable in final yr’s trial, this one is just targeted on defamation damages for 2 statements Trump made in 2019. Carroll’s attorneys additionally requested for extra punitive damages over Trump’s persevering with to insult Carroll and demand she lied when she mentioned he raped her.

This time, the previous president seems to be itching for a battle.

He has attended all however in the future of the trial to date, typically whispering in his attorneys’ ears. In statements exterior courtroom, he has continued disparaging Carroll — one thing the jury will nearly actually contemplate because it weighs how a lot to impose in punitive damages.

Final week, he advised the choose he “would like it” if he was kicked out of the courtroom for being disruptive. On Monday, Trump’s lawyer Alina Habba mentioned he intends to take the witness stand in his protection.

Trump’s two driving impulses — to battle the system and to take the witness stand — will create the judicial equal of a automotive wreck, consultants advised Enterprise Insider.

“It is like throwing fuel on a raging hearth at this level for him to testify,” John Jones, a former federal choose in Pennsylvania, mentioned.

Jilting the choose and jury in order that he can play to his MAGA followers can be an enormous gamble, based on Jones.

“Positive, you would play to your base and use this stuff as marketing campaign rallies and appearances,” Jones mentioned. “However the truth of the matter is, it might generate an enormous verdict towards him.”

The choose has given Trump little room to maneuver

In quite a few pretrial hearings, US District Decide Lewis Kaplan, who has overseen each circumstances, has sharply restricted the scope of Carroll’s second trial.

Beneath a authorized doctrine known as collateral estoppel — primarily, that the sooner jury verdict has a binding impact on the associated lawsuit — Trump and his attorneys aren’t allowed to disclaim that he raped and defamed Carroll.

As a result of these points have been resolved, Trump can also’t reopen them by speaking about associated points together with the left-leaning billionaire who funded a part of Carroll’s go well with (the choose dominated it has no impact on her credibility) the shortage of DNA proof (Trump refused to offer his DNA for testing for years), or a few of Carroll’s media interviews (the jury within the first case already thought of them).

And whereas a defamation professional who testified for Carroll’s group discovered that it could take $12 million to restore her status, Trump’s attorneys failed to produce their very own professional witness till shortly earlier than the trial. The choose barred the professional from testifying, ruling Trump’s authorized group waited approach too late and there wasn’t ample time for vetting. Except for Trump himself, the one witness his attorneys mentioned they may name in his protection is Carol Martin, a longtime good friend of Carroll’s who corroborated her model of occasions within the first trial.

“I do not know what he might presumably say. He is in a field,” Jones, who now serves because the president of Dickinson Faculty, advised Enterprise Insider. “He seems to have been regularly probably defaming her throughout the trial.”

Trump testifying can be a nightmare state of affairs for any lawyer, significantly given his open hostility to the choose. Habba has already had issue following the guidelines of civil process in Kaplan’s courtroom. His taking the witness stand will not make issues simpler.

“He is a maniac. He is buzzing in her ear whereas she’s making an attempt to take heed to the choose,” Jones mentioned. “On the identical time, he sees any sort of cooperation by her with the choose fairly clearly as traitorous as not having the best hearth to fulfill him.”

Habba — who was already sanctioned in a federal courtroom in Florida for submitting a lawsuit on Trump’s behalf primarily based on a conspiracy concept — might go down with the ship.

“She has this Faustian pact. She’s going to work for him and she or he’s going to do his bidding,” Jones mentioned. “And if he desires her to be an anarchist and be unprofessional in courtroom, then that is what she needs to be.”

If Trump does take the stand, his solely transfer can be to “invoke the mercy rule” and present contrition, hoping that the jury will not award an excessive amount of in damages, Jones mentioned.

Given Trump’s habits to date, asking Carroll for forgiveness can be extraordinarily unlikely.

Chris Mattei, an lawyer who gained a $1.5 billion jury verdict towards Alex Jones on behalf of the relations of Sandy Hook capturing victims, advised Enterprise Insider that there was no level to Trump testifying except he was “simply making an attempt to create a circus.”

“There is no such thing as a midway competent lawyer who would advocate to Donald Trump that he ought to testify on this case except he was going to apologize and say that he had dedicated himself to by no means doing it once more,” Mattei mentioned. “We all know that is not going to occur.”

How a lot rope will Trump get?

Earlier than Trump takes the witness stand, Kaplan will nearly actually remind him of the bounds of what he is permitted to testify about and get his assurance that he will not cross these boundaries.

If Kaplan is not glad that Trump will abide by his rulings, he might preclude him from testifying, Jones mentioned. Alternatively, Trump can get on the witness stand and “attempt to testify in a story style,” Jones mentioned.

“He’ll take a query and simply run with it and do what he does, which is stream of consciousness, and go off on tangents and so forth to a level that there will be objections or the choose will cease him in his testimony,” Jones advised Enterprise Insider. “And I feel that is so fraught, it might occur just about with each reply.”

That is principally what occurred late final yr, when Trump testified in his civil fraud trial introduced by the New York Legal professional Basic’s workplace. Although New York Supreme Courtroom Justice Arthur Engoron had set parameters about what Trump might testify about, Trump trammeled by way of these limits anyway. He went on prolonged soliloquies about the fantastic thing about Mar-a-Lago’s structure, mused on the unknowable nature of brand name worth, supplied polemics criticizing the choose, and complained in regards to the US Justice Division for its legal circumstances towards him.

An exasperated Engoron begged Trump’s attorneys to regulate him however largely allowed him to supply his monologues. The choose dominated that components of the testimony have been “stricken,” which means he wouldn’t contemplate it proof whereas deciding his rulings.

However Trump’s fraud trial had no jury (Engoron is anticipated to concern a written ruling subsequent month from the bench). Carroll’s trial does have a jury, making it more durable to “unring that bell” of forbidden testimony, Jones mentioned.

There may be additionally the query of what Carroll’s attorneys need. Will they attempt to rein Trump in? Or wager that he’ll inflict wounds on himself by taking the witness stand?

“That is the one space the place Ms. Carroll’s attorneys might conclude that the extra rope you give Trump, the extra he’ll cling himself,” Mattei mentioned.

The choose might kick Trump off the witness stand

In a state of affairs the place Trump breaks Kaplan’s guidelines, the choose can resolve that he is forfeited his proper to testify and inform him to step down from the witness stand, Jones mentioned.

Trump, who’s working to retake the presidency within the 2024 election, might calculate that selecting a battle with the choose might profit his marketing campaign. If the choose punishes him for violating his rulings, Trump might use it as an excuse to complain that he’s being unfairly persecuted.

“If he will get carried out on his defend as a result of he bought ejected from the courtroom by Kaplan, then he’ll go and boast that the system is rigged,” Jones mentioned.

Whereas that may reinforce help amongst his Republican base, it will possible look horrible for the jury, Mattei mentioned. Carroll’s attorneys, of their opening assertion, requested the jury to impose large enough punitive damages that will “make him cease” defaming her.

“Possibly he desires that confrontation, however it isn’t one thing that’s going to endear him to the jury in any approach,” Mattei mentioned. “The jury is more likely to see Trump’s refusal to adjust to the courtroom’s orders — and if he is allowed to say it, his continued insistence that he did not assault Ms. Carroll and did not defame her — as principally further cause why he must be punished.”

Kaplan might maintain Trump in contempt and high quality him and even theoretically put him in jail. However the consultants Enterprise Insider interviewed agreed that was an unlikely state of affairs.

Extra possible, they mentioned, the jury watching Trump embarrass himself will probably be punishment sufficient. Jones mentioned that if the jury sees Trump as making an attempt to browbeat the choose, they’re going to possible aspect with the choose.

“The choose sees that they are seated within the field, offers them breaks throughout the day, dismisses them on the finish of the day, talks to them thanks them for his or her work,” Jones mentioned. “So after they see a lawyer trampling the choose or a litigant trampling the choose, they do not prefer it.”

Jones pointed to Rudy Giuliani’s trial final month, over defaming two Georgia election staff who he falsely mentioned rigged the 2020 election outcomes. The employees’ attorneys requested for a bit greater than $40 million in compensatory damages. However Giuliani continued to falsely accuse them of election rigging at the same time as he sat trial.

The jury returned a $148 million verdict — a lot of it in punitive damages — forcing Giuliani into chapter 11.

Whereas Trump is a billionaire, it isn’t clear if he is liquid sufficient to deal with an enormous jury verdict.

And whereas judges have the authority to deem verdicts disproportionate and decrease them, there isn’t any cause to assume he’ll accomplish that in Trump’s case.

“It’d need to be awfully excessive for him to disturb it,” Jones mentioned.

A large verdict doesn’t, nevertheless, imply that Trump will probably be deterred from persevering with to name Carroll a liar.

Forbes has estimated Trump’s wealth at $2.6 billion.

“I do not assume he’ll be deterred one iota by a big verdict,” Jones mentioned.