In a rape trial 35 years ago, five convicts later proved innocent. Statements about this in the presidential debate are now a new problem for Donald Trump.
According to US media, five men who were convicted in a rape case and later exonerated are suing Donald Trump. The men known as the “Central Park Five” through the legal case accuse the presidential candidate of defaming them during the TV debate with his opponent Kamala Harris.
Trump falsely claimed that the five men had pleaded guilty to the crime and killed the victim. “None of this is true,” their lawyer Shanin Specter told US broadcaster NBC News. According to US media, the lawsuit was filed in a court in Philadelphia, the venue of the TV debate on September 10th.
Innocent in prison
In 1989, the teenagers at the time – four blacks and one Latino – were sentenced to prison after raping a 28-year-old in New York’s Central Park. Four were in prison for seven years, one for 13 years. It wasn’t until 2002 that DNA tests and another man’s confession proved her innocence. In 2014, they were awarded $41 million in compensation.
“There is no doubt that these men are not guilty,” Specter said. Trump, against his better judgment, is sticking to his old hate campaign against men. At the time of her conviction, then-real estate manager Trump had taken out full-page advertisements in several newspapers calling for the reintroduction of the death penalty in New York. In the debate with Harris, he justified this: It was said that the men had pleaded guilty and ultimately killed one person. However, the accused denied the crime in court and the victim survived with serious injuries.
The lawsuit alleges election interference
The 78-year-old Trump, who was US President from 2017 to the beginning of 2021, is aiming for re-election to the White House on November 5th as a Republican candidate. A spokesman for his campaign called the lawsuit another attempt by “desperate left-wing activists” to use litigation to influence the election.
The story of the “Central Park Five” was filmed, among other things, in the Netflix miniseries “When They See Us”. One of those now called “the exonerated five,” Yusef Salaam, was elected to the New York City Council as a Democratic politician at the end of 2023.
Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
