An attorney for Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, had urged the eight-person jury to “send a message” with its verdict.

An attorney for Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, had urged the eight-person jury to “send a message” with its verdict.

Rudy Giuliani should pay a pair of Georgia election workers he repeatedly and falsely accused of fraud $148 million in damages, a federal jury said Friday.

The eight-person jury awarded Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, the sum after a four-day trial, during which they testified that Giuliani’s lies in support of former President Donald Trump’s bogus stolen-election claims subjected them to a torrent of racist and violent threats and turned their lives upside down.

Freeman testified Wednesday that she was terrorized by Trump supporters and forced to move from her home because of Giuliani’s smears. “I was scared to come home at dark, you know,” a visibly emotional Freeman said on the witness stand. “I was just scared, I knew I had to move.”

  • Milk_Sheikh@lemm.ee
    19·
    1 year ago

    From the reporting I read, the huge cost is driven by the need for a ‘counter-messaging’ campaign to debunk the existing, repeated libel committed by Rudy. Given how his words were broadcast wide and often, the claimants will have to basically keep a PR team employed for several years until her name is restored or forgotten - which is very expensive.

    There’s absolutely the usual pain and undue suffering award as well, but that’s not what ballooned this judgment