Roberta Kaplan, the attorney who represented E. Jean Carroll in her defamation lawsuit against Donald Trump, said the former president stormed out of a deposition ahead of the trial.
Carroll, a former Elle magazine columnist, sued Trump for defamation after he accused her of lying about her allegations that he assaulting her in a Manhattan department store changing room in the mid-1990s. A New York City jury last May found him liable and ordered him to pay $5 million in damages for sexual abuse and defamation against Carroll, but he continued to say she was lying, leading to the second lawsuit. The trial was civil, not criminal, meaning he faced only financial penalties, not jail.
Last week, a jury ordered Trump to pay an additional $83 million in damages. Trump has denied any wrongdoing and said he plans to appeal the verdict, which he described as "absolutely ridiculous."
Kaplan discussed the case in an interview on the podcast George Conway Explains It All (to Sarah Longwell), hosted by Conway, an attorney, and Longwell, publisher of The Bulwark.A clip of the podcast, which has not been formally released, was first reported by CNN.
During the interview, Kaplan discussed Trump's behavior during a deposition in which he allegedly stormed out of after his attorney, Alina Habba, offered lunch to Carroll's attorneys.
Kaplan said Trump asked her where she planned to get lunch on the day of the deposition, to which she responded that his attorneys "graciously offered to provide us with lunch."
"At which point there was a huge pile of documents, exhibits, sitting in front of him, and he took the pile and he just threw it across the table. And stormed out of the room," Kaplan said.
She then said that Trump "really yelled at Alina for that" and was "so mad at Alina," CNN reported.
Newsweek reached out to Trump's campaign for comment via email. He has not publicly responded to the allegations made by Kaplan.
During the trial, Trump and his attorneys garnered significant attention for their behavior in the courtroom. There were several tense exchanges involving them with Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, who was tasked with overseeing it and is not related to Roberta Kaplan.
In one instance, Judge Kaplan threatened to remove Trump from the courtroom after he allegedly made comments to his lawyers during the first day of testimony.
Following the trial, Trump has continued to attack Judge Kaplan in posts to his social media platform Truth Social, calling him a "bully" and an "extremely abusive individual."
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Andrew Stanton is a Newsweek weekend reporter based in Maine. His role is reporting on U.S. politics and social issues. ... Read more
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