Trump seeks delay of rape and defamation trial
Former US President Donald Trump’s lawyers have asked to postpone for a month the trial scheduled for April 25 in which he is accused of raping the author E. Jean Carroll three decades ago and recently defaming her, according to a document published by the court on Wednesday.
Trump’s defense argues that his “right to a fair trial depends on a brief cooling off period” following the “barrage of damaging media coverage of his indictment” in the criminal case over alleged irregular payments to hush up harmful information ahead of the 2016 elections, which he won.
In the letter, addressed to Judge Lewis Kaplan, they point out that holding this trial at the end of April “will ensure that many, if not all, potential jurors” will have “in mind” the historic accusation of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office regarding the alleged Trump’s “extra-marital affair” with porn actress Stormy Daniels.
The lawyers consider this a “unique situation” because “recent coverage relates to alleged sexual misconduct,” such as in the author’s litigation, adding that the sheer volume of news stemming from that case is generating increased interest in de Carroll.
The new date they ask for is May 23,at the earliest, calculating that a “window” of time opens in which the jury at Carroll’s trial “will likely be more impartial” than now.
Carroll, 79, accused Trump of rape in a book and in a magazine article in 2019, something he denied calling her publicly lying and making derogatory comments about his appearance, after which the author decided to launch a legal battle against him for defamation.
