Rudy Giuliani (C) arrives at a New York court on November 7, 2024, after receiving a judge’s order forcing him to appear in a defamation lawsuit filed by Georgia election officials in New York.
Rockman Vral Eribor | Anadolu | Getty Images
A New York federal judge ruled Thursday that Trump’s former lawyer Rudy Giuliani bought personal property including luxury watches, baseball memorabilia and a 1980 Mercedes-Benz to satisfy at least part of the $146 million. He threatened to prosecute her for contempt of court if she did not hand him over. Defamation verdict in favor of two Georgia election officials.
Judge Louis Lehman reprimanded Mr. Giuliani’s lawyer, Kenneth Caruso, for suggesting that the former New York mayor did not know where some of his assets were located.
“The idea that customers don’t know where their assets are is a travesty,” Lehman said during a hearing in U.S. District Court in Manhattan.
“All property must be handed over to the receiver or I will hold him in contempt,” the judge told Mr. Caruso, whose client had become angry, cocky and irritable at one time or another during the proceedings. was.
Mr. Lehman instructed lawyers for the two plaintiffs in the case, Ruby Freeman and Wandrea Moss, to instruct Mr. Giuliani’s lawyers where and how to deliver the items by Monday.
Aaron Nathan, the women’s attorney, said in a court filing earlier this week that Mr. Giuliani emptied all confiscated items from his multimillion-dollar Manhattan apartment, which was also to be forfeited to the women. He told Mr. Lehman that he had done so.
Mr. Nathan said Mr. Giuliani thwarted his efforts to learn the whereabouts of the items.
“The vast majority of the physical assets, we have no idea where they are,” Nathan said during Thursday’s hearing. I was just playing games.
Giuliani has said the items are in his homes in New York and Palm Beach, Florida, and in a storage facility in Ronkonkoma, Long Island, which he claims he cannot access.
Mr. Nathan claimed that Mr. Giuliani opened secret bank accounts and formed a limited liability company following last year’s defamation judgment.
Before appearing in court Thursday, Giuliani was furious that the judge had ordered him to appear, calling it “like political persecution.”
Giuliani was found guilty in federal court in Washington, D.C., of defaming two women during the 2020 presidential election, when he represented President-elect Donald Trump, alleging voter fraud on voting sites. I received it. In this case, he was ordered to pay them $146 million.
On Thursday, Giuliani was asked if he had called President Trump since winning the most recent presidential election, and he said, “Yes.”
Asked what Trump said, Giuliani said, “I’m not going to tell you.”
Outside court after the hearing, he said he believed an appeal would result in the verdict being set aside and the items returned.
He also said he had never denigrated women.
