If the plaintiffs in Rudy Giuliani's defamation case are awarded the full amount they're asking, "It will be the end of Mr. Giuliani," a lawyer for the former New York City mayor and Trump attorney said at Monday's start of the trial to determine the damages Giuliani, who's already been found liable for defamation, owes. "There's really no question that these plaintiffs were harmed," Giuliani lawyer Joseph Sibley said of Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and daughter Shaye Moss, per Politico. He called them "good people," saying, "They didn't deserve what happened to them." The damages they're claiming, though, are "truly incredible," he said.
"What the plaintiffs' counsel are asking for in this case is the civil equivalent of a death penalty," Sibley said, per the New York Post. "What happened to them is because of a controversy that involved a lot of people. It wasn't just Mr. Giuliani," he said of Freeman and Moss. "You're going to see a lot of evidence of harm … but not much evidence that Mr. Giuliani was the cause." Per the Post, lawyers for the plaintiffs say reputational damages could come to $47 million and punitive damages could add "tens of millions" to that. (More Rudy Giuliani stories.)