Former US President Donald Trump has been found guilty of sexual abuse and defamation in a civil trial in New York. This was announced by the jury on Tuesday after a few hours of deliberations. The now 79-year-old American author E. Jean Carroll had accused Trump of raping her in 1996 in a high-end York department store. According to the jury, Trump should pay Carroll five million dollars in damages for defamation and assault.

The former president did not take the opportunity to testify at the trial. Before the verdict, he wrote on his social network Truth Social on Monday that it was "false accusations". He also claimed that he was prohibited from "speaking out or defending himself" and that he was being "silenced."