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2025 Supreme(US)(ca2) 105
COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT
Carroll – Appellant
Versus
Trump – Respondent
This case involves an appeal by Donald J. Trump following a civil judgment against him for sexual assault and defamation, brought by E. Jean Carroll. The appellate court reviewed various evidentiary rulings made during the trial, including the admissibility of certain prior acts and statements under specific rules of evidence. The court considered whether the district court properly exercised its discretion in admitting evidence such as a recorded conversation and testimonies about past incidents involving the defendant, as well as the application of rules related to propensity evidence and the relevance of remote past acts. The panel ultimately upheld the district court’s decisions, emphasizing deference to the lower court’s judgment, while a dissenting judge argued that some evidence was improperly admitted and that the rulings could have influenced the jury’s verdict. The court reaffirmed the importance of applying standard evidentiary rules consistently, regardless of the defendant’s identity, and concluded that the errors alleged did not warrant en banc review or a reversal of the judgment.
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT
At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, held at the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of New York, on the 13th day of June, two thousand twenty-five. Present: DEBRA ANN LIVINGSTON, Chief Judge, RAYMOND J. LOHIER, JR., MICHAEL H. PARK, WILLIAM J. NARDINI, STEVEN J. MENASHI, EUNICE C. LEE, BETH ROBINSON, MYRNA PÉREZ, SARAH A. L. MERRIAM, MARIA A. KAHN, Circuit Judges. _____________________________________ E. JEAN CARROLL,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v. 23-793
DONALD J. TRUMP,
Defendant-Appellant. _____________________________________
1 For Defendant-Appellant: D. John Sauer, James Otis Law Group, LLC, St. Louis, MO.
Todd Blanche & Emile Bove, Blanche Law, New York, NY. For Plaintiff-Appellee: Roberta A. Kaplan (Matthew J. Craig, on the brief), Kaplan Martin, LLP, New York, NY.
Joshua Matz & Kate Harris, on the brief, Hecker Fink LLP, Washington, DC.
Following disposition of this appeal on December 30, 2024, an active judge of the Court requested a poll on whether to rehear the case en banc. A poll having been conducted and there being no majority favoring en banc review, the petition for rehearing en banc is hereby DENIED.
Myrna Pérez, Circuit Judge, joined by Eunice C. Lee, Beth Robinson, and Sarah A. L. Merriam, Circuit Judges, concurs by opinion in the denial of rehearing en banc.
Steven J. Menashi, Circuit Judge, joined by Michael H. Park, Circuit Judge, dissents by opinion from the denial of rehearing en banc.
Denny Chin and Susan L. Carney, Circuit Judges, filed a statement with respect to the denial of rehearing en banc.
Richard J. Sullivan, Joseph F. Bianco, and Alison J. Nathan, Circuit Judges, took no part in the consideration or decision of the petition.
FOR THE COURT: Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk
2 MYRNA PÉREZ, Circuit Judge, joined by EUNICE C. LEE, BETH ROBINSON, and SARAH A. L. MERRIAM, Circuit Judges, concurring in the denial of rehearing en banc:
Defendant-Appellant appealed a civil judgment against him for sexual assault and defamation, challenging several of the district court’s evidentiary rulings. For the reasons discussed at length in its unanimous opinion, the panel, on which I sat, found no reversible abuse of discretion. See Carroll v. Trump, 124 F.4th 140 (2d Cir. 2024) (per curiam). The panel applied the now-axiomatic rule that, when reviewing evidentiary determinations, “an appellate court must defer to the lower court’s sound judgment, so long as its decision falls within its wide discretion and is not manifestly erroneous.” United States v. Tsarnaev, 595 U.S. 302, 323 (2022) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).
The dissenting opinion would have us stray far from our proper role as a court of review. Without acknowledging the deferential standard we are duty-bound to apply, the dissenting opinion offers several arguments, many of which were not raised by Defendant to the panel or in his petition for rehearing.
Simply re-litigating a case is not an appropriate use of the en banc procedure. In those rare instances in which a case warrants our collective consideration, it is almost always because it involves a question of exc
