Day 6 of Trump Rape Trial: A Parade of Witnesses With an End in Sight

On the sixth trial day of the writer E. Jean Carroll’s lawsuit accusing former President Donald J. Trump of rape, her lawyers are expected to continue calling witnesses to bolster her account of the attack and the aftermath.

Ms. Carroll’s lawyers were expected Wednesday to continue examining Dr. Leslie Lebowitz, a clinical psychologist and trauma specialist who testified on Tuesday that she had been asked to evaluate whether Ms. Carroll had been harmed as a result of the alleged attack by Mr. Trump.

Dr. Lebowitz, who has spent about 22 hours interviewing Ms. Carroll, testified that she had suffered from years of painful, intrusive memories and a “diminishment in how she thought and felt about herself.”

“Perhaps most prominently,” Dr. Lebowitz said, “she manifests very notable avoidance symptoms, which have curtailed her romantic and intimate life and caused profound loss.”

Ms. Carroll’s lawyer Roberta A. Kaplan said on Tuesday that among the witnesses Ms. Carroll’s team plans to call on Wednesday are Natasha Stoynoff, another woman who has accused Mr. Trump of sexual assault, and Carol Martin, a friend of Ms. Carroll who she says she told about the attack shortly after it happened. It was Ms. Martin who advised her not to go to the police, Ms. Carroll testified.

Ms. Kaplan said they also expected that Ms. Carroll’s sister would testify.

Ms. Kaplan said she planned to finish presenting Ms. Carroll’s case perhaps by midday on Thursday. Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Joseph Tacopina, told the judge, Lewis A. Kaplan of Federal District Court, that his client would not be coming to court to testify, suggesting that the trial could go to the jury early next week.

The Accusation

Ms. Carroll said she visited Bergdorf Goodman one evening in the mid-1990s. As she was leaving through a revolving door, Mr. Trump entered and recognized her, she testified, and persuaded her to help him shop for a gift for a female friend. She has accused the former president of going on to attack her in a dressing room in the lingerie department.

In the Courtroom

On Tuesday, Lisa Birnbach, a writer and friend of Ms. Carroll, testified that she was in her kitchen one night in the spring of 1996, feeding her children dinner at around 6 p.m., when she got a call from Ms. Carroll.

“She said, ‘Lisa, you are not going to believe what happened to me,’” Ms. Birnbach testified. She said Ms. Carroll sounded “breathless, hyperventilating, emotional.”

“E. Jean said to me many times, ‘He pulled down my tights, he pulled down my tights,’ almost like she couldn’t believe it,” Ms. Birnbach testified about the call. She described how Ms. Carroll told her that Mr. Trump penetrated her with his penis.

Ms. Birnbach testified that they hadn’t talked again about what was shared on that phone call until 2019.

During Ms. Birnbach’s cross-examination, a lawyer for Mr. Trump, W. Perry Brandt, zeroed in on her political leanings. Ms. Birnbach, a Democrat, willingly acknowledged having made campaign contributions to Hillary Clinton and President Biden.

Mr. Brandt also spent several minutes delving into a podcast Ms. Birnbach hosted from 2018 to 2021. He read excerpts from transcripts of episodes in which Ms. Birnbach called Mr. Trump “Vladimir Putin’s asset” and “a narcissistic sociopath.”

Ms. Birnbach was followed on the stand by another of Ms. Carroll’s witnesses, Jessica Leeds, a former stockbroker who said Mr. Trump assaulted her on an airplane in the late 1970s. Ms. Carroll’s lawyers called her to establish Mr. Trump’s “modus operandi.”

Ms. Leeds said she had been flying home to New York when a flight attendant invited her to first class. She testified that there was one empty seat — next to Mr. Trump.

Ms. Leeds said that “out of the blue” Mr. Trump “decided to kiss me and grope me.”

“It’s like he had 40 zillion hands,” Ms. Leeds said, adding that he put his hand up her skirt. She said she managed to wriggle away before returning to her original seat.

Ms. Leeds said she went public with her accusation in 2016 during Mr. Trump’s presidential run. And the jury was shown a video of Mr. Trump denying her allegation, telling a crowd at a rally, “Believe me, she would not be my first choice, that I can tell you.”