Last update: 03 May 2023, 02:57 HST
Jessica Leeds, right, arrives in federal court to testify in a trial against former President Donald Trump in New York, Tuesday, May 2, 2023. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
Trump denies all sexual assault allegations and has never been criminally prosecuted for such allegations
A woman testified in a civil trial in New York on Tuesday that Donald Trump sexually assaulted her on a flight to the United States in the late 1970s.
Jessica Leeds recounted the alleged attack while giving evidence in writer E. Jean Carroll’s rape and libel trial against the ex-president.
Trump denies all allegations of sexual assault and has never been criminally prosecuted for such allegations.
Leeds told Manhattan federal court that Trump put his hand up her skirt in the business class section of a flight to New York in 1978 or 1979.
“There was no conversation. It was like out of the blue,” said Leeds, now 81.
“He was trying to kiss me, grabbing my breasts,” she added.
Leeds first made the allegation in an interview with The New York Times a few weeks before the 2016 election that sent Trump to the White House.
A dozen women have come forward to accuse Trump of sexual misconduct ahead of the vote.
Leeds went public with the accusation after Trump refuted the sexual assault allegations during a presidential debate with Hillary Clinton.
“I was furious because he was lying,” Leeds recalled.
Leeds was called to give evidence by Carroll’s lawyers in an attempt to persuade the nine-person jury that Trump engaged in a pattern of sexual misconduct.
Carroll, 79, sued Trump alleging he sexually assaulted her in a dressing room at the Bergdorf Goodman luxury department store in Manhattan in the mid-1990s.
She also claims that Trump then defamed her when he called her a “complete jerk” after going public with the allegation in 2019.
Trump has repeatedly and strenuously denied the allegations.
Carroll sued late last year after a New York law took effect that gave victims of sexual assault a year to sue their alleged attackers decades later. that the assaults could have occurred.
The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and asks Trump to withdraw his comments.
No criminal charges can arise from Carroll’s civil case, but if Trump loses, it will be the first time he has been held legally responsible for a sexual assault allegation.
The case is one of several legal challenges Trump faces as the 76-year-old Republican seeks to return to the White House in next year’s election.
Last month he pleaded not guilty in a criminal case related to a silent payment made to a porn star just before the 2016 vote.
Trump is also under investigation over his efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss in the southern state of Georgia, his alleged mishandling of classified documents taken from the White House and his involvement in taking storming of the US Capitol by his supporters on January 6, 2021. .
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(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed)
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