The famous trials of the 21st century run from Bernard Madoff’s Ponzi-scheme sentencing to Donald Trump becoming the first U.S. president convicted of felonies, and along the way they reset the rules on sexual assault prosecutions, police use of force, corporate fraud, online defamation, and tech monopolies. Digital broadcasting and social media turned many of these proceedings into shared national events, and the verdicts, reversals, and appellate rulings they produced now sit at the center of American law.
Sexual Assault Prosecutions of Powerful Men
Bill Cosby’s 2018 retrial ended in conviction on three counts of aggravated indecent assault involving Andrea Constand, with five other women testifying as prior-bad-acts witnesses. He was sentenced to three to ten years in state prison. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court later vacated the conviction, holding that Cosby had relied on a prior prosecutor’s public decision not to file charges when he gave incriminating testimony in a civil lawsuit, and that a later prosecutor’s use of that testimony violated his due process rights. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the ruling, and Cosby was released after nearly three years.
Harvey Weinstein’s case became the defining criminal proceeding of the #MeToo era. A New York jury convicted him in 2020 of a first-degree criminal sexual act and third-degree rape, producing a 23-year sentence. A Los Angeles trial then added 16 consecutive years on three counts of rape and sexual assault.1NPR. Harvey Weinstein Sentenced to 16 More Years in Prison In April 2024 New York’s highest court overturned the original conviction, with Judge Jenny Rivera writing for the majority that the trial judge had wrongly allowed prosecutors to call women testifying about assaults Weinstein was never charged with, diminishing his character before the jury. A New York retrial in mid-2025 produced a conviction on one count and a mistrial on the remaining rape charge, and a third trial on that charge ended with a deadlocked jury in May 2026. The Los Angeles conviction still stands.
Ghislaine Maxwell’s 2021 federal trial addressed her role recruiting and grooming underage girls for Jeffrey Epstein. The jury convicted her on five of six counts, including sex trafficking of a minor and conspiracy to transport minors for illegal sexual activity, and she was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison.2U.S. Department of Justice. Ghislaine Maxwell Sentenced to 20 Years in Prison for Conspiring With Jeffrey Epstein to Sexually Abuse Minors The Second Circuit upheld the conviction in 2024, rejecting her arguments on jury selection and evidence.3Justia Law. United States v. Maxwell, No. 22-1426 (2d Cir. 2024)
Michael Jackson’s 2005 trial belongs on the same shelf for a different reason. He faced ten felony counts, including four counts of lewd acts upon a child under 14 and one count of conspiracy. The defense highlighted inconsistencies in the accusers’ statements and suggested financial motive. The jury acquitted him on every count.
The Largest Financial Fraud Trials
Bernard Madoff’s 2009 guilty plea exposed the largest Ponzi scheme in history. He admitted to eleven federal felonies, including securities fraud, investment adviser fraud, mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, perjury, and theft from an employee benefit plan. For decades he had paid redemptions to existing clients with new investor money while generating thousands of pages of fabricated account statements. The court sentenced him to 150 years in federal prison.4Federal Bureau of Investigation. Bernard Madoff Sentenced to 150 Years in Prison
Elizabeth Holmes went to trial from 2021 into 2022 on nine counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy tied to her blood-testing company, Theranos. Former employees and lab directors testified that the company’s Edison devices were unreliable and that Theranos ran samples on commercial machines made by other manufacturers. The jury convicted her on four counts of defrauding investors and acquitted her on the patient-related charges.5U.S. Department of Justice. U.S. v. Elizabeth Holmes, et al. She was sentenced to 135 months in federal prison. Each wire fraud count carried a maximum penalty of 20 years under the federal wire fraud statute, which criminalizes using interstate communications to execute a scheme to defraud.6Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 1343 – Fraud by Wire, Radio, or Television The verdict signaled that executives cannot hide behind startup culture when they knowingly mislead investors about a product’s capabilities.
Sam Bankman-Fried’s 2023 trial was the defining fraud case of the cryptocurrency era. Prosecutors showed that the FTX founder had secretly funneled billions in customer deposits to his hedge fund, Alameda Research, while publicly claiming the funds were safe. The jury convicted him on all seven counts, including two counts of wire fraud, two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, and one count each of conspiracy to commit securities fraud, commodities fraud, and money laundering. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison and ordered to forfeit over $11 billion.7U.S. Department of Justice. Samuel Bankman-Fried Sentenced to 25 Years in Prison
Policing, Race, and Self-Defense
The 2021 trial of Derek Chauvin, a former Minneapolis police officer, was the most closely watched police accountability case in decades. He faced second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter for the death of George Floyd during an arrest. Medical experts for the prosecution testified that Floyd died from a lack of oxygen caused by the physical restraint; the defense pointed to pre-existing health conditions and controlled substances in Floyd’s system. The jury returned guilty verdicts on all three counts, and Chauvin was sentenced to 22 and a half years, well above Minnesota’s presumptive guideline of 12 and a half years for a first-time offender. The prosecution’s legal framework drew heavily on Graham v. Connor, which requires courts to judge the reasonableness of force from the perspective of a reasonable officer at the scene rather than with hindsight.8Justia U.S. Supreme Court Center. Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386 (1989) That case remains the controlling standard for excessive force claims nationwide.
The killing of Ahmaud Arbery in 2020 produced two rounds of prosecution. A Georgia state jury convicted Travis McMichael, Gregory McMichael, and William Bryan of murder in November 2021 for chasing and fatally shooting Arbery as he jogged through their neighborhood. A separate 2022 federal trial resulted in hate crime convictions for all three, the court finding they targeted Arbery because of his race. Travis and Gregory McMichael each received federal life sentences plus additional time for weapons charges; Bryan was sentenced to 35 years.9U.S. Department of Justice. Federal Judge Sentences Three Men Convicted of Racially Motivated Hate Crimes in Connection With the Killing of Ahmaud Arbery
Two self-defense trials framed the century’s debate over armed civilians. George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch volunteer, was tried in 2013 for the shooting death of Trayvon Martin on charges of second-degree murder and manslaughter.10U.S. Department of Justice. Federal Officials Close Investigation Into Death of Trayvon Martin The defense invoked Florida’s self-defense statutes and argued a reasonable fear of imminent death during a physical struggle; prosecutors contended Zimmerman had profiled and pursued Martin. The jury acquitted him on both counts. Kyle Rittenhouse, then 18, was tried in 2021 for homicide, attempted homicide, and recklessly endangering safety for shooting three men during protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 2020, killing two and wounding a third. He testified that each person he shot was actively attacking him; prosecutors argued he had inserted himself into a volatile situation with an AR-style rifle. The jury acquitted him on all counts.
The Boston Marathon Bombing Trial
The federal prosecution of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev for the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing was the most significant terrorism trial since September 11th. He was convicted on all 30 counts, including using a weapon of mass destruction resulting in death, and the penalty phase produced a death sentence. A federal appeals court vacated the sentence in 2020, finding the trial judge had failed to adequately screen jurors for bias given the pretrial publicity. In March 2022 the Supreme Court reversed 6-3 and reinstated the death sentence. Justice Thomas, writing for the majority, held that the trial court had not abused its discretion in jury selection and had properly excluded evidence about an unrelated triple murder linked to Tsarnaev’s older brother.11Supreme Court of the United States. United States v. Tsarnaev, 595 U.S. (2022) Tsarnaev remains on federal death row.
Defamation Cases That Changed the Public Conversation
The 2022 defamation trial between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard, watched live by tens of millions, tested the actual malice standard on a modern stage. Depp sued Heard for $50 million over a 2018 opinion piece in which she described herself as a survivor of domestic abuse, and Heard countersued for $100 million. As a public figure, Depp had to show under New York Times Co. v. Sullivan that Heard knew her statements were false or acted with reckless disregard for the truth.12United States Courts. New York Times v. Sullivan The jury found that both parties had defamed each other but awarded Depp $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages, with Virginia’s statutory cap reducing the punitive figure to $350,000. Heard received $2 million in compensatory damages on one counterclaim.
The defamation proceedings against Alex Jones followed a different path. Courts in Texas and Connecticut entered default judgments against Jones after he repeatedly failed to comply with discovery orders, so the trials focused on damages alone. A 2022 Texas jury awarded the families of Sandy Hook victims nearly $50 million. A Connecticut jury awarded $965 million, and a judge added $473 million in punitive damages, taking the Connecticut judgment to roughly $1.4 billion. The Supreme Court rejected Jones’s appeal of the Connecticut judgment, leaving the total across all cases at approximately $1.5 billion. Witnesses described the sustained harassment they endured from his audience after he falsely claimed the 2012 school shooting was staged.
A President in the Dock and Big Tech on Trial
In May 2024 Donald Trump became the first current or former U.S. president to be convicted of felony charges when a Manhattan jury found him guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying business records in the first degree.13Manhattan District Attorney’s Office. D.A. Bragg Announces 34-Count Felony Trial Conviction of Donald J. Trump Prosecutors argued that he disguised reimbursements for hush-money payments as legal expenses to conceal information from voters before the 2016 election. The defense said the payments were legitimate legal fees and that no election law was violated. In January 2025 the judge sentenced Trump to an unconditional discharge, meaning the conviction stands on his record but carries no prison time, fine, or probation.
The federal government’s antitrust case against Google was the most significant monopoly trial in a generation. In August 2024 a federal judge in Washington, D.C. ruled that Google violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act by using exclusive distribution agreements to maintain its monopoly in general search services and search text advertising. The court found that Google’s deals with device manufacturers and browser companies foreclosed roughly half the market by search volume. A separate federal case in Virginia produced a 2025 ruling finding additional Sherman Act violations in the ad exchange and publisher ad server markets. Both cases are in the remedies phase, and Google has said it intends to appeal.
Apple faced its own antitrust reckoning in Epic Games v. Apple, which challenged the App Store’s requirement that developers use Apple’s payment system and pay commissions of up to 30 percent. The trial court ruled for Apple on nine of ten claims and found the company was not a monopoly under federal antitrust law, but held that Apple’s anti-steering provisions, which prohibited developers from telling users about cheaper payment alternatives outside the app, violated California’s Unfair Competition Law. The Ninth Circuit upheld that ruling, and Apple was permanently barred from enforcing those restrictions.14Justia Law. Epic Games, Inc. v. Apple, Inc., No. 21-16506 (9th Cir. 2023)