Legal professionals for Rudy Giuliani are begging jurors to not grant two Georgia election employees the up-to $43 million in damages they’ve requested of their defamation case towards the previous Trump legal professional.
Earlier than the court docket on Monday, Giuliani’s lawyer Joe Sibley referred to as the proposed damages “the civil equal of the dying penalty.”
“In case you award them what they’re asking for, it is going to be the tip of Mr. Giuliani,” he said.
In August, Giuliani was found liable for defaming Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, two Georgia election employees who he falsely accused of taking part in vote manipulation within the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election. A jury trial, which started Monday, will decide how a lot Giuliani owes the 2 ladies in damages. Moss and Freeman have requested a sum between $15.3 million and $43 million in compensatory and punitive damages.
The 2 ladies have publicly mentioned the repercussions of Giuliani’s conspiracy theories about them. During testimony earlier than the Jan. 6 Committee in June of final 12 months, Moss recounted how she and her mom had been publicly accused by Giuliani of getting exchanged a “USB drive” filled with votes. When requested what her mom had truly handed to her Moss replied that the thing was “a ginger mint.”
Moss additionally detailed the various threats made towards her by Trump supporters, noting that they had been instructed they need to “grasp for committing treason.” In keeping with Moss, folks went to her grandmother’s house and tried to “burst down the door and conduct a citizen’s arrest of my mother and me.”
Sibley argued on Monday that whereas Giuliani had dedicated defamation, as decided by the court docket, it was not Giuliani himself who had threatened and harassed Moss and Freeman.
In August, Giuliani was one among 18 people indicted alongside former President Donald Trump in a sprawling Georgia RICO case relating to the cohort’s efforts to intrude with the outcomes of the 2020 election within the state. The indictment particularly referenced Giuliani’s position in engineering intimidation and harassment towards Freeman and Moss.
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