Central Park Five members sue Donald Trump for defamation

Oct. 21 (UPI) -- The five men known as the "Central Park Five," who were wrongfully convicted of raping a jogger in 1989, sued Donald Trump for defaming them in his September presidential debate with Vice President Kamala Harris .

Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana, Kevin Richardson, Antron Brown and Korey Wise, who were all exonerated in the case in 2002 and now refer to themselves as the "Exonerated Five," said Trump tried to reconnect them to the case during the Sept. 10 debate with Harris, knowing that his claim was untrue.

"Plaintiff never pled guilty to any crime and were subsequently cleared of all wrongdoing," court documents said, according to CNBC . "Further, the victims of the Central Park assaults were not killed."

The lawsuit is asking for damages of more than $75,000 with compensatory and punitive damages to be determined for defamation, false light, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

In the presidential debate when the two candidates talked about race, Trump defended his past position that the men were guilty of the1989 rape.

"They admitted -- they said, they pled guilty," Trump said during the debate. "And I said, well, if they pled guilty they badly hurt a person, killed a person ultimately, And if they pled guilty -- then they pled we're not guilty."

Shortly after the 1989 rape when the five were charged, Trump took out a full-page ad in New York newspapers calling for the death penalty for "those who would murder our citizens and terrorize NewYork" without specifically mentioning them.

The real rapist was identified in 2002 after a confession backed by DNA evidence from the case.