Global Courant 2023-04-28 07:10:20
Photo illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Reuters/Getty
Today, Donald Trump’s lead attorney Joe Tacopina cross-examined E. Jean Carroll after she testified that Donald Trump raped her in the 1990s.
During his moment in the spotlight, Tacopina was mocking, derogatory and dismissive. This was perhaps the most tone-deaf rape cross-examination since To Kill A Mockingbird.
The fireworks started from the first moment, when Tacopina started, “Good morning, Mrs. Carroll.” She did not answer in kind, but instead remained silent – which was appropriate, as there was no pending question. Mr. Tacopina, visibly distressed, raised his voice and repeated, “Good morning, Mrs. Carroll!” At that point, she finally replied, “Good morning.”
From there it went downhill.
When Tacopina insinuated that Ms. Carroll only had a “story” that she was raped by Donald Trump, she gave no ground.
Q: That’s the book you included the story of your alleged rape by Donald Trump in a Bergdorf Goodman locker room, right?
A: Not supposedly. I was raped.
When Mr. Tacopina tried to back off again, she stood her ground.
Q: That’s your version, right, Ms. Carroll, that you were raped.
A: Those are the facts.
Jury has probably already decided on Trump’s fate in the rape case
Tacopina then disparaged Ms. Carroll’s testimony that she had not come forward before Trump’s election because she was caring for her dying mother.
Q: So when you testified yesterday that you didn’t want to come forward at this time, even though he was running for president and you claimed he raped you, you didn’t want to because one of the reasons you said was you mother dying, right?
A: She was on her deathbed. My sisters and brother and I had joined her at the end of September to spend our last weeks together.
Q: And in the end your mother sadly passed away in October 2016, right?
A: Yes.
. . .
Q: And that’s more or less a month before the election took place, correct?
A: Yes.
Q: So why didn’t you come up with the story after your mother died before he was elected?
Story continues
A: I was in deep, unbelievable, painful grief.
Question: How old was your mother when she passed away?
A: 97. She would have been 98.
Q: This had nothing to do with the book not being ready, right, Ms. Carroll, the reason you didn’t come out at the time?
A: I hadn’t had the idea of writing a book at that point.
The jurors almost certainly overheard that conversation when Tacopina stated that Ms. Carroll’s claim that she was “in deep, incredible, painful grief” must be a lie, because no one could be surprised by the death of a 97-year-old woman. If Tacopina didn’t already have a juror on his side, that question would almost certainly turn that juror against him.
Tacopina’s “Gotcha” moment fell flat
After belittling Mrs. Carroll’s grief, Tacopina then went for the kill, using a text exchange between Carroll and Carol Martin (who will testify on Mrs. Carroll’s behalf) to show that they had a “plan” to get Trump to get.
Carroll explained that in the lyrics, “Once we’re both good enough to make plans, we’ll have to redo our patriotic duty,” the word “plan” was “a typical word Carol and I use, without the connotation of evil .It’s just a word we use.”
Tacopina lost control of this style of questioning when he asked how Ms. Carroll couldn’t remember that email but remember her conversation with Ms. Martin 28 years earlier.
Carroll responded scathingly: “I told Carol Martin what Trump did to me in the locker room. Those are facts I could never forget. This is one email, among probably hundreds of emails between Carol and me, that I don’t remember, but I suspect it’s something funny.
Tacopina later attacked Carroll’s reliability based on her testimony that she laughed, but did not scream, when Donald Trump began raping her. He wasn’t doing well.
Q: In response to this supposedly serious situation that you viewed as a fight, where you were physically injured, is it actually your story that you not only didn’t scream, but started laughing?
A: I didn’t yell. I started laughing. That’s right. I don’t think I started laughing. I think I laughed as I entered the locker room, and I think I laughed pretty consistently after the kiss to absolutely throw cold water at whatever he thought was going to happen. Laughter is very good – I use the word weapon – to calm a man when he has erotic intent.
Former Elle advice columnist E. Jean Carroll answers questions from attorney Joe Tacopina during a civil trial to decide whether former US President Donald Trump raped Carroll in a locker room of a Bergdorf Goodman department store in the mid-1990s.
Reuters/Jane Rosenberg
Tacopina was not deterred and redoubled his attack.
Question: If you fight and are sexually assaulted and raped, because you are not a screamer, as you describe it, wouldn’t you scream?
A: I am not a shouter. You can’t beat me up because I don’t scream.
Finally, Tacopina stated outright that Carroll had no “story” for why she only screamed after talking to a psychiatrist, Dr. Lebowitz (who will provide expert testimony in the case).
Carroll then burst into indignation: “I didn’t come up with a story. It’s usually – I would say more than usual – up for debate when a woman is being raped and she isn’t screaming. It’s usually talked about, why didn’t she scream, E. Jean? Why didn’t you yell? It’s what a woman – you better have a good excuse why you didn’t yell. Because if you didn’t scream, you wouldn’t have been raped. I tell you, he raped me whether I screamed or not.”
It was as if Mr. Tacopina had learned nothing from the public reaction to The Accused, which won five Oscars in 1988.
Tacopina, with nothing to back up his questions, also expressed disbelief at Ms. Carroll’s testimony that she countered Trump’s suggestion that he try on the lingerie by suggesting that he try it on instead. The exchange did not go as he expected:
A: I had written a similar scene on Saturday Night Live and was nominated for an Emmy for a man getting dressed in front of a mirror. The idea was hilarious to me.
Q: You wrote a scene for Saturday Night Live about a man putting on lingerie over a suit?
A: About a man who got dressed in the bathroom and he was wearing his underwear.
Q: About his suit?
A: No. It was just a man in his bathroom falling in love with himself in front of the mirror.
Question: To you, is that a similar scene to Donald Trump, in the middle of Bergdorf Goodman, wearing his suit, trying on a piece of women’s lingerie?
A: That’s how my mind works. This is how comedy is born. You take two opposite things, put them together and you get a new scene. That’s where comedy comes from.
Question: Has that ever aired on Saturday Night Live?
A: Yes.
Q: When was that?
A; 1987 William Shatner played the part.
As a litigator, I am amazed that Mr. Tacopina went down this route, not knowing that Ms. Carroll was in fact nominated for an Emmy for writing that sketch.
As I wrote yesterday, I don’t know if the jurors believed Carroll’s direct testimony that she was raped by Trump. Based on my more than 25 years as a trial attorney, including service as an Assistant Attorney of the United States focusing on sex crimes, I am confident that a juror who did not already believe that Mrs. Carroll lied in her direct testimony would not are convinced by one of the cross-examinations that she was a liar.
In fact, it seemed that Tacopina – who is a very capable litigator – had an agenda that placed more value on being mean to Ms. Carroll than undermining her credibility. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was a direct order from Donald Trump.
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