A UK judge on Friday hailed the youngest son of US President Donald Trump for his “lifesaving” actions after he remotely witnessed a friend being assaulted.
Barron Trump, 20, alerted emergency services in the UK last year after accidentally seeing the violence during a video call.
The court heard Russian national Matvei Rumiantsev, 22, attacked the woman having become jealous of her friendship with the younger Trump.
Jailing Rumiantsev for four years, Judge Joel Bennathan said the victim feared she would be killed and managed to call 999 herself.
But Rumiantsev snatched away the phone and dragged her back by her hair when she briefly managed to get outside to try to seek help from a neighbour.
“At one stage in the violence there was a call to or from her friend Barron Trump,” the judge said.
“He saw you beating her up and you held the phone and filmed her, an angry act to humiliate her.
“Mr Trump properly and responsibly, despite being in the United States, made sure the emergency services here were called, and he told them what he had seen,” he added.
Rumiantsev was found guilty of assault causing actual bodily harm in January 2025 and perverting the course of justice, but acquitted of two separate charges of rape, as well as another assault charge from November 2024.
– ‘Totally unrepentant’ –
“You are a man given to jealousy and you have a temper,” Bennathan told Rumiantsev, adding that he remained “totally unrepentant”.
Barron Trump’s surprise involvement in the criminal case at Snaresbrook Crown Court, northeast of London, attracted media attention when details were outlined for jurors.
Trump — the only son of the US president and First Lady Melania Trump — called British police from the United States on January 18, 2025, reporting he had witnessed the assault during a video call with the woman whom he said he was “very close with”.
The woman cannot be identified for legal reasons.
In a transcript shown to the court, Barron Trump told the London police operator: “I just got a call from a girl” who is “getting beat up”.
“She’s getting really badly beat up and the call was about 8 minutes ago, I don’t know what could have happened by now,” he added.
He said in a later email to the investigating police he had not expected the woman to answer his call due to the time difference with the United States.
But “to my dismay” it was answered by “a shirtless man”.
“The camera was then flipped to the victim getting hit while crying, stating something in Russian. The guy had hung up,” Trump wrote.
During the call, he would not initially tell the operator how he knew the woman, but after being admonished for being “rude” eventually explained he “met her on social media”.
Add Comment