Washington (AFP) - A federal jury began hearing arguments in Washington on Monday to determine how much former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani should pay for defaming two Georgia election workers.
US District Judge Beryl Howell, in a ruling in August, found Giuliani liable of defaming Fulton County poll workers Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea Moss with his November 2020 election lies.
Howell entered what is known as a default judgment against Giuliani for his failure to comply with court demands that he turn over evidence in the case.
An eight-person jury in Washington is to decide how much the 79-year-old Giuliani should pay for falsely accusing Freeman and Moss of engaging in election fraud.
They are seeking up to $43 million in compensatory and punitive damages.
Freeman and Moss testified before the congressional committee that investigated the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol by supporters of former president Donald Trump that the false accusations had upended their lives.
Moss, who is Black, described people making "hateful" and "racist" threats of violence following the baseless accusations, including one message saying: "Be glad it's 2020 and not 1920."
"This turned my life upside down," Moss testified.
The defamation case is one of a number of legal challenges facing Giuliani, who has been indicted in Georgia along with Trump and others for conspiring to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in the southern state.
Giuliani served as the mayor of New York from 1994 to 2001, guiding the city through the shock of the September 11 attacks, and was Trump's personal lawyer while he was in the White House.
Hunter Biden, President Joe Biden's son, has also filed a lawsuit against Giuliani accusing him of computer fraud for accessing personal data on his computer.
In 2020, in a bid to embarrass Joe Biden ahead of the election, Giuliani and Trump allies circulated data from a laptop that Hunter Biden allegedly abandoned at a computer repair shop in Delaware.
