Trump Rape Accuser Cancels Press Event

LOS ANGELES (CN) — A woman accusing Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump of raping her when she was 13 years old canceled an afternoon press conference where she was to talk publicly about her claims.

The woman known as Jane Doe in her lawsuit was due to hold a press conference at 3 p.m. at the Bloom Law Firm in Woodland Hills but had second thoughts, her attorney Lisa Bloom told reporters.

"She is living in fear," Bloom said. "She has decided that she's too afraid to show her face. She's been here all day ready to do it but unfortunately, she's in terrible fear. So we're going to have to reschedule."

Reviving a suit she initially filed in Los Angeles, Doe brought a federal complaint against Trump in New York. The Sept. 30 action claims the real estate mogul-turned-reality TV host-turned-GOP presidential nominee raped her during the summer of 1994 at the New York residence of financier Jeffery Epstein.

She says she was an aspiring model at that time, and was "enticed by promises of money and a modeling career" to attend parties at Epstein's home.

She also accuses Epstein, who is a convicted sex offender, of raping her at a later party.

According to her 10-page lawsuit, Trump "initiated sexual contact" on four different occasions.

"On the fourth and final sexual encounter with defendant Trump, defendant Trump tied plaintiff to a bed, exposed himself to plaintiff, and then proceeded to forcibly rape plaintiff," Doe says in her complaint.

Calling Trump's actions "savage," the woman says she asked Trump to stop but that he answered by "violently striking plaintiff in the face with his open hand and screaming that he would do whatever he wanted."

According to her complaint, Trump threatened that her family would be "physically harmed if not killed" if she ever reported the attack.

The same lawsuit makes a defamation claim over statements Trump and his attorney made respectively to RadarOnline and to Courthouse News Service.

"The allegations are not only categorically false, but disgusting at the highest level and clearly framed to solicit media attention or, perhaps, are simply politically motivated," Trump said this past April. "There is absolutely no merit to these allegations. Period."

Trump Organization general counsel Alan Garten offered a similar comment to Courthouse News shortly before Doe sued and threatened to seek sanctions against her attorney.

The GOP nominee's campaign has been scrambling since a 2005 video emerged this past month in which Trump can be heard bragging to a giggling "Access Hollywood" host about being able to grope women because of his celebrity.

That bombshell had initially given an edge in the pollls to Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, but the race has since tightened. On Friday, 11 days before the election, FBI Director James Comey sent a letter to Congress stating that the agency had discovered emails that "appear pertinent to the investigation" of the private server Clinton used as secretary of state.

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