Court Allows E. Jean Carroll to Collect USD 5.8 Million in Trump Sexual Abuse and Defamation Lawsuit

A federal judge has ordered that writer E. Jean Carroll be paid approximately USD 5.8 million , including accrued interest, from funds held in escrow after a jury found that US President Donald Trump sexually abused and defamed her. The ruling marks another major development in a years-long legal battle that has drawn national attention in the United States.

Judge Lewis A. Kaplan issued the order after the US Supreme Court recently declined to disturb the 2023 civil verdict , effectively clearing the way for the money to be released. Trump had deposited the original USD 5 million award into an escrow account shortly after the jury delivered its decision. His lawyers immediately appealed Kaplan's order and sought emergency relief to block the transfer, but Judge Eunice C. Lee of the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals rejected that request, allowing the payment process to move forward.

The case stems from allegations made by Carroll , a longtime magazine columnist and advice writer, who said Trump sexually assaulted her in the dressing room of a luxury Manhattan department store in the mid-1990s . Trump consistently denied the accusation, saying he did not know Carroll and dismissing her claims as false.

In 2019 , after Carroll recounted the alleged incident in a memoir and subsequent interviews, Trump publicly denied the allegation and questioned her credibility. Carroll then sued him for defamation . Later, after New York enacted a law temporarily giving survivors of sexual abuse a renewed opportunity to pursue civil claims over decades-old incidents , she filed a separate lawsuit accusing Trump of sexual abuse and defamation .

Following a trial in 2023 that Trump did not attend, a federal jury concluded that Trump was liable for sexual abuse and for defaming Carroll through his public statements . The jury awarded her USD 5 million in damages , a sum that has since increased to roughly USD 5.8 million with interest.

In his ruling, Kaplan wrote that Trump had delayed satisfying the judgment for years and that it was time for him to pay what was owed. Carroll's lawyers argued that their client had already waited more than three years to receive the compensation awarded by the jury.

Trump continues to deny Carroll's allegations and has argued that the legal actions against him are politically motivated. He is also separately appealing another USD 83 million defamation award granted by a Manhattan jury in a related case arising from additional statements he made about Carroll after the first verdict. That appeal remains pending.