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Trump Fights Back: Urges Judge to Dismiss Explosive Central Park Five Defamation Lawsuit

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The lawsuit charging U.S. President-elect Donald Trump of making derogatory remarks during his campaign regarding five Black and Hispanic men who were wrongfully convicted and imprisoned for the 1989 rape of a white jogger in New York’s Central Park was dismissed by a federal judge on Wednesday. In a court filing, Trump’s attorneys claimed that his remarks on the men—who are commonly referred to as the Central Park Five—were legally protected expressions of opinion. In 2002, fresh DNA evidence and a confession from someone else freed the Central Park Five. Trump lied when he claimed to have killed someone and entered a guilty plea during a presidential debate with Democrat Kamala Harris on September 10.

Trump’s lawyers said that the First Amendment of the US Constitution “protects the President-elect’s speech about matters of public concern.” A request for a statement from Trump’s transition team was not immediately answered, and a lawyer for the president at Dhillon Law Group declined to comment. Trump announced Monday he will appoint Harmeet Dhillon, founder of the Dhillon Law Group, to head the Justice Department’s civil rights section.

Attorney Shanin Specter, who represents the Central Park Five (Korey Wise, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Kevin Richardson, and Antron Brown), stated that they anticipated Trump’s arguments would be unsuccessful.
“We look forward to taking discovery and proceeding to trial,” added Specter. According to the lawsuit, Trump’s “demonstrably false” assertions purposefully caused emotional anguish and painted the plaintiffs in a negative light.

The men’s lawyers claimed that they made false confessions that they later withdrew. They never entered a guilty plea. Trump’s remarks regarding the Central Park Five have already received criticism. He raised awareness of the case and placed a full-page ad in many New York newspapers advocating for the resumption of the death sentence following the jogger’s assault.

Prerna Sharma
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