EXPLAINED: How a chance encounter from the 90s came back to haunt Donald Trump

An old encounter, a tell-all memoir, and a New York State law appear to have changed Donald Trump's fate forever, adding yet another accusation to his list of controversies. As a New York jury concludes hearing the closing arguments of writer E Jean Carroll's rape lawsuit against Trump, we take a look at everything that led to this moment.

In the mid-1990s, Carroll was out and about in Manhattan when a Bergdorf Goodman department store caught her eye. But her decision to step into it would, decades later, involve her in a court battle with the President of the United States. Court proceedings began on April 25 in a New York City courtroom that saw the former Elle magazine columnist testifying that Trump raped her at the store years ago.

Jean Carroll releases explosive book

But this wasn't the first time that she had said those words out in public. In 2019, when Trump was president, Carroll released a book titled 'What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal'. Inside the book was an excerpt that read she was shopping at Bergdorf-Goodman when Trump walked up to her and tried to start a conversation by asking her to help him select a gift for an unknown woman.

In the book, she alleged that things took a turn for the worse when he took her to the store's lingerie area and told her to try on a blue bodysuit on the pretext that he was considering to purchase it. Trump then allegedly pushed her against a wall and sexually assaulted her for about three minutes.

Carroll recalls horrifying encounter with Trump in testimony

At the court in April, she recalled the incident and testified that “he was having a good time, and so was I". After the duo reached the changing room, Carroll said that Trump “shut the door and shoved me up against the wall”. “I was confused. I laughed,” she said, adding that the former president then “thurst” her, removed her clothes, and tried to penetrate her with his fingers.

“It was extremely painful. It was a horrible feeling. He put his hand inside me and curled his finger. As I sit here today, I can still feel it," she said. The court then asked her if she yelled in distress, to which she responded, “I’m not a screamer. I’m a fighter.” She further alleged that Trump then raped her. “I wonder why I walked in there, to get in that situation... I’m proud to say I got out of there,” she said, according to The Independent.

What Trump says 

Furthermore, she revealed that the incident left her feeling “very stupid” and “unable to ever have a romantic life again”. When Carroll came out with the allegations in 2019, Trump refuted each one of them, claiming that she was lying to boost her book's sales. He told reporters at the White House that he had “never met her” and did not rape her because she was “not [his] type".

“She is trying to sell a new book – that should indicate her motivation,” the then-president said, adding that the book “should be sold in the fiction section." But Carroll was carrying proof to back her claim, and she shared an image of herself and Trump together at an NBC party held in 1987.

The tale of two lawsuits 

This prompted her to file a defamation lawsuit against him in November, although the case is yet to head to trial. But Carroll went on to file another lawsuit, thanks to New York lawmakers who passed the Adult Survivors Act which allowed victims of sexual abuse to sue their perpetrators in a one-year window for attacks that occurred years ago.

This lawsuit, which alleges that Trump raped and then subsequently defamed Carroll, finally made it to trial, and is now unraveling in a New York court. The plaintiff says that Trump's denial made her "suffer reputational, emotional, and professional harm” and she has sued him “to obtain redress for those injuries and to demonstrate that even a man as powerful as Trump can be held accountable under the rule of law".

After the defamation suit reached the court in 2019, Trump's legal team requested the Department of Justice to help defend him. This made the department file papers demanding Trump to be shielded from liability because he made the allegedly defamatory statements when was acting in an official capacity as president.

Trial underway, but Trump nowhere to be seen

However, this was rejected by US District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who is supervising the trial and gave it the green light to proceed. Another move by Trump's legal team in 2022 was also squashed by Kaplan, who said that Trump's desperate attempts to postpone the case were “futile” and in “bad faith”.

Earlier in April, Trump's attorneys said that the civil trial should be pushed to a later date given the former leader's recent indictment which could create bias among the jury. However, this was also turned down by Kaplan. “There is no reason to assume that a sufficient number of fair and impartial jurors cannot be found on April 25, 2023 or that it would be materially easier to find such jurors on May 23, 2023,” he said. With Trump failing to testify in the trial and passing a deadline for it, the judge has said that “That ship will be irrevocably sailed". As the court drama unfolds, one question remains- Will this have any fallout on Trump's 2024 presidential bid? Only time will tell.