E. Jean Carroll Feared Jury Wouldn't Believe She Was 'Attractive Enough to Assault' in Trump Trial

Published: June 17, 2025

E. Jean Carroll, the former Elle advice columnist and TV host, is opening up about her legal battle to hold him accountable for sexual assault in her new memoir, Not My Type.

In 2023, the president was found guilty of sexually abusing and defaming Carroll. In her book, she shares the challenging task of reviving the image of someone who was "attractive enough to assault" in the eyes of the jury.

Carroll first raised allegations against Trump in 2019, 23 years after the assault. In 2023, when Carroll's resulting suit was brought before a jury, she was 80 years old, which she anticipated a jury would struggle with.

"Nobody's gonna believe an 80-year-old woman was ever attractive enough to assault," she said in an exchange between her, her lawyer Robbie Kaplan, and a jury consultant Reiko Hasuike.

Carroll then suggested to the team that she cut her hair into a bob, the haircut she had at the time Trump confronted her in a Bergdorf dressing room. Her lawyer insisted that photos from the time of the assault would be enough for the jury.

But after a test trial, Kaplan and Hasuike both had the same exact response: "Bob your hair."

So Carroll hunted down her old stylist, Lisa Corvelli, "the Great Giver of Bobs" and her stylist from the time of the assault. As Corvelli assessed her client's hair, Carroll shared that the three test juries all agreed that "something sexual happened in that dressing room" between Trump and her, but struggled to believe it wasn't a consensual encounter.

Carroll told Corvelli, who was in disbelief, "I had to be the one to egg Trump on. Because I'm too old and unattractive to attack."

Thus began the women's pursuit to perfect the image of someone "attractive enough to assault." Corvelli crafted an exact replica of the 1996 bob, complete with the blonde hue.

Carroll's memoir, Not My Type, is available now, wherever books are sold.