Donald Trump Accused of Rape in Federal Court Lawsuit
The assaults are alleged to have taken place at the home of billionaire and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
By Kali Holloway / AlterNet
June 21, 2016
Photo Credit: a katz / Shutterstock.com
A
new lawsuit filed in Manhattan Federal Court alleges that Donald Trump
repeatedly raped a 13-year-old girl a little over 20 years ago.
According to the now-adult woman’s filing, the sexual assaults took
place at parties held by Jeffrey Epstein, the billionaire former hedge
funder who pleaded guilty in 2008 to charges involving soliciting sex
from underage girls as young as 14.
In the filing, the woman
states the assaults took place in 1994. She said Epstein lured her to
his Upper East Side home—then dubbed Wexner Mansion—with promises of a
career in modeling and large sums of money. Once there, Jane Doe says
she was violently raped by Trump, according to Death and Taxes:
In
the court filing, “Defendant Trump” allegedly “initiated sexual contact
with Plaintiff at four different parties. On the fourth and final
sexual encounter with Defendant Trump, Defendant Trump tied Plaintiff to
a bed, exposed himself to Plaintiff, and then proceeded to forcibly
rape Plaintiff. During the course of this savage sexual attack,
Plaintiff loudly pleaded with Defendant Trump to stop but with no
effect. Defendant Trump responded to Plaintiff’s pleas by violently
striking Plaintiff in the face with his open hand and screaming that he
would do whatever he wanted.”
In the next section, she adds
that “Immediately following this rape, Defendant Trump threatened
Plaintiff that, were she ever to reveal any of the details of the sexual
and physical abuse of her by Defendant Trump, Plaintiff and her family
would be physically harmed if not killed.”
Jane Doe describes, in
graphic detail, being anally and vaginally raped, and also being
physically struck by Epstein. The complaint goes on to allege that
Epstein threatened Jane Doe's safety and that of her family should she
reveal the attack to outside sources. “Both defendants let plaintiff
know that each was a very wealthy, powerful man and indicated that they
had the power, ability and means to carry out their threats,” the
complaint states, according to the Real Deal.
Death and Taxes
reports a second anonymous woman, identified as "Tiffany Doe," who
corroborates the charges in the lawsuit, stating that she witnessed the
rape. Tiffany Doe testified that between 1991 and 2001, Epstein put her
on his payroll, tasking her with bringing underage girls to parties.
Epstein—who
was alleged to have preyed on dozens of underage girls throughout the
1990s and early aughts, but was convicted on a single charge for which
he served 13 months—has disputed the woman’s claims. Trump Organization
vice president and general counsel Alan Garten issued a statement saying
the charges are “categorically untrue, completely fabricated and
politically motivated,” according to the Daily News.
The lawsuit
was originally filed in a California court. At the time, Jane Doe—who
used her real name—did not have the aid of counsel in filing and the
suit was dismissed due to problems with paperwork. Doe's new lawyer,
Thomas Meagher, told the Daily News the first filing also “cited
statutes that did not apply to the case.”
Jane Doe is suing for
$75,000, payment of her attorney’s fees, and an order of protection
against Trump. She says she waited many years before filing suit out of
fear that Trump and Epstein would make good on their promises to harm
her family.
Trump has long admitted to being friendly with
Epstein, telling New York Magazine several years ago, “I've known Jeff
for 15 years. Terrific guy. He's a lot of fun to be with. It is even
said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are
on the younger side. No doubt about it, Jeffrey enjoys his social
life."
In 2009, Mark Epstein, Jeffrey’s brother, testified under
oath that Trump flew at least once on Epstein’s private plane, the
so-called “Lolita Express,” according to Vice. (According to flight
logs, so did Bill Clinton.) The site also notes that Epstein’s private
phone book, of which the FBI has a copy, includes phone numbers and
information for Donald Trump, along with Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia,
Tony Blair, former Utah governor and Republican presidential candidate
Jon Huntsman, Senator Edward Kennedy, Henry Kissinger, and David Koch.
Vice
writes that “in 2010, Epstein pled the Fifth when asked by a lawyer
representing one of Epstein's victims about his relationship with Trump:
Q: Have you ever had a personal relationship with Donald Trump?
A. What do you mean by "personal relationship," sir?
Q. Have you socialized with him?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Yes?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Have you ever socialized with Donald Trump in the presence of females under the age of 18?
A:
Though I'd like to answer that question, at least today I'm going to
have to assert my Fifth, Sixth, and 14th Amendment rights, sir.”
In
the 1993 book Lost Tycoon: The Many Lives of Donald J. Trump,
biographer Harry Hurt points to a deposition in which Trump’s ex-wife
Ivana accused the billionaire of marital rape. According to the Daily
Beast, which revisited the charge last year, just before the book went
to print, Donald Trump’s lawyers provided a new statement from Ivana, in
which she mitigated her original words:
“During a deposition
given by me in connection with my matrimonial case, I stated that my
husband had raped me. [O]n one occasion during 1989, Mr. Trump and I had
marital relations in which he behaved very differently toward me than
he had during our marriage. As a woman, I felt violated, as the love and
tenderness, which he normally exhibited towards me, was absent. I
referred to this as a ‘rape,’ but I do not want my words to be
interpreted in a literal or criminal sense.”
In her complaint,
Jane Doe contends that Donald Trump was aware that she was 13 at the
time of the assaults. The full text of the court filing is below.
Kali Holloway is a senior writer and the associate editor of media and culture at AlterNet.
Friday, June 24, 2016
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