Giuliani must transfer assets to defamed election workers
Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani attends a ceremony in Zucotti Park, organized by the Tunnel to Towers Foundation, on the 19th Anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, New York, NY, September 11, 2020 (Anthony Behar/Sipa USA)(Sipa via AP Images).
A federal judge on Tuesday ordered Rudy Giuliani to transfer control of his Manhattan apartment, valuables, and cash accounts to a mother-daughter pair of Georgia election workers he defamed.
On Monday, Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss asked U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman to order Giuliani to “turn over personal property in his possession” and to appoint them as “receivers with the power to take possession of, and sell, both real and personal property that Mr. Giuliani does not turn over.”
While some requests were set aside for procedural reasons, the lion’s share of the requests were granted in favor of Freeman and Moss.
In a 24-page ruling, the court ordered Giuliani “to transfer all” of his “personal property” — as itemized in a list contained in the order — “including cash accounts, jewelry and valuables, a legal claim for unpaid attorneys’ fees, and his interest in his Madison Avenue co-op apartment to a receivership” for the plaintiffs “within seven days.”
“To date, Defendant has neither paid any portion of the Judgment nor obtained a stay,” the court explained — meaning Giuliani has essentially no excuse to further stall Freeman and Moss from collecting.
The marquee asset, of course, is the penthouse apartment unit located in a Madison Avenue co-op building on the Upper East Side — most recently listed for sale at about $5.4 million.
“The sale of luxury real estate is a highly specialized field,” the court explains. “Given the need to engage in a sophisticated sales process and given the idiosyncrasies of New York City co-operatives in particular, the Court finds that the interests of Plaintiffs and Defendant will best be served by ordering the Defendant’s co-operative shares into receivership.”
In December 2023, Freeman and Moss won a $148 million default defamation verdict over a campaign against the women in which Giuliani falsely proclaimed the pair were engaged in fraud and had “cheated” voters during the 2020 presidential election.
The pair have since been engaged in various forms of litigation to avail their monetary interests against the onetime federal prosecutor — including legal filings in both bankruptcy courts and district courts. They also recently sued him, again, for defamation.
Monetizing the multimillion-dollar apartment would only satisfy a fraction — though clearly a substantial one — of the debt the former New York City mayor owes. To that end, Freeman and Moss have sought various other stores of value, realized and potential.
Perhaps secondary in value to the apartment, and listed second in Liman’s order, is Giuliani’s interest in a legal claim against Donald Trump’s 2020 reelection campaign for unpaid legal bills related to unsuccessful efforts at reversing President Joe Biden’s victory.
Giuliani himself previously — during his since-shelved bankruptcy proceedings — raised the $2 million claim against the Trump campaign. Meanwhile, Freeman and Moss raised the claim in the present case — an effort to enforce their defamation case judgment — in late August.
Earlier this month, Giuliani sought to pause all litigation — even all in-court mentions of said claim — until after the 2024 election.
“Plaintiffs will or may use this assignment for an improper, political (or, at least, collateral) purpose, creating the confusing, and inaccurate, appearance that Defendant is now somehow suing candidate Trump, thereby generating an accompanying, and unnecessary, media frenzy,” the Giuliani memo reads. “Plainly, the value of this claim will not depreciate between now and November 6, 2024.”
The judge noted those concerns — and dismissed them outright.
“The profound irony manifest in Defendant’s alleged concern is not lost on the Court,” Liman writes. “By his own admission, Defendant defamed Plaintiffs by perpetuating lies about them. Defendant’s lies cast unwarranted doubt on the integrity of the ballot-counting in Fulton County, Georgia in the immediate wake of the 2020 Presidential Election. Plaintiffs are entitled as a matter of law to pursue any outstanding interest of the Defendant’s in satisfaction of their judgment.”
Turning the Trump claim over to the plaintiffs is “particularly appropriate,” the court said, because Giuliani’s “political commitments” might preclude him from suing the 45th president.
While a thorough win for Freeman and Moss, it was not a sweep.
The court deferred ruling on a request to transfer Giuliani’s Florida condo to the plaintiffs because the Palm Beach property is subject to another lawsuit with an upcoming hearing on similar issues.
Liman also decided against granting Freeman and Moss ownership of three New York Yankees World Series rings. True ownership of those rings is in dispute after Giuliani’s son, Andrew Giuliani, intervened as a party in the judgment enforcement lawsuit. The younger Giuliani claims there is proof — in the way of photographic evidence — that his father gifted those rings to him back in May 2018.
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