What to Know
In case you missed it, President Donald Trump’s youngest son, Barron Trump, is currently involved in a trial taking place in the United Kingdom. The trial has thrust him into the spotlight, which he normally manages to avoid. Just over a year ago, Barron reportedly called the police after a concerning FaceTime call with a friend in England. He told the operator that the woman was “getting beat up.” The man who allegedly assaulted the woman during the call, Matvei Rumiantsev, is currently on trial.
According to recent reports, a judge warned people about trusting Barron’s account of what happened because he might be “biased.”
Barron called the police on January 18 of last year.
When first responders arrived at the scene after receiving the report from Barron, they asked the woman to give Barron a call and confirm whether or not he was the one who contacted them. During this interaction, he told officers, “I picked up the phone expecting a nice hello or something. I just saw a ceiling and could hear screaming. I could see a guy’s head on the phone, and then the camera turns to her crying and getting hit.”
He added, “I called you guys — that was the best thing I could do. I wasn’t going to call back and threaten things to him because that would just make the situation worse.”
During his initial call to the police, he emphasized that the situation was “really an emergency.” At first, he declined to share how he knew the woman, but he eventually said they connected with each other on social media.
However, a judge warned jurors about Barron’s perspective.
On January 26, British High Court Justice Joel Bennathan told jurors that Barron “has not given evidence on oath and been tested in cross-examination,” Metro reported. He told the jury that they should be “careful” and “cautious” because of this.
“If he had done so, no doubt he could have been asked about things such as whether he ever got a good view of what happened, whether he actually saw (the complainant) being assaulted, or jumped to this conclusion on the basis of her screams,” the judge explained, according to the publication.
Bennathan told the jurors that they “can rely on” Barron’s account of what happened, but they should “consider if it could be mistaken or biased by his friendship with (the complainant), and not convict the defendant mainly in reliance on it.”
The man said he “was jealous to some extent.”
Matvei faces charges of assault, actual bodily harm, rape, intentional strangulation, and perverting the course of justice, CNN previously reported. When questioned about whether he was jealous of men who the woman spoke to (including Barron), he said, “What I was really unhappy about was that she was frankly leading [Barron] on.”
He also claimed that he’s “being portrayed as a jealous person who can lose his temper due to jealousy,” and focused on how the woman’s behavior was allegedly “wrong” and “not fair.”
According to multiple British outlets, the woman previously credited Barron with saving her life on the night that he called the police. “He helped save my life,” she said. “That call was like a sign from God at that moment.”
