148 million dollars - Ex-Trump lawyer Giuliani sentenced to heavy fine for defamation
Former US President Donald Trump's private lawyer Rudy Giuliani has been sentenced to pay damages of more than 148 million dollars (136 million euros) for defamation, according to media reports. According to US media, the verdict was announced on Friday after two election workers from the state of Georgia sued Giuliani over a video in which he falsely accused them of electoral fraud after the presidential election in November 2020. Giuliani must therefore pay both plaintiffs around 37 million dollars each for defamation and its psychological consequences for the women, as well as 75 million dollars in damages.
The US federal judge responsible had already found former New York mayor Giuliani guilty in August of defaming 64-year-old Ruby Freeman and her 39-year-old daughter Wandrea Moss.
Ex-lawyer of Donald Trump: Rudy Giuliani has a series of legal problems
Following Trump's election defeat to Democrat Joe Biden in November 2020, Giuliani was a central figure in the unelected incumbent's attempts to overturn the outcome of the election with the help of unfounded allegations of fraud and thus keep himself in office. Shortly after the election in November 2020, he published a video of the two election workers during the vote count in which he falsely accused the women of electoral fraud and made other unfounded allegations about them.
Giuliani now has a number of legal problems. For example, he was indicted along with Trump in a criminal case in Atlanta on charges of vote rigging.
The 79-year-old was once highly respected as mayor of New York and was celebrated as "America's mayor" after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Giuliani, who was born in 1944 in the New York borough of Brooklyn as the son of Italian immigrants, later became a loyal companion to Trump.
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Source: www.stern.de
