Ruth. Gehrig. DiMaggio. Mantle. Giuliani? As Rudy Giuliani's life gets stripped for parts to satisfy a $148 million defamation verdict, the former New York City mayor is fighting to keep one gleaming set of sports memorabilia in the family: Yankees World Series rings bestowed to him by the team's late owner, George Steinbrenner. A lifelong Bronx Bombers fan, Giuliani contends that the rings—bejeweled behemoths commemorating the team's four championships in five years while he was mayor— now belong to his son, Andrew, and shouldn't be given up, per the AP. In sworn testimony made public this week, ahead of a pair of key court dates, Giuliani described the 1996, 1998, 1999, and 2000 World Series rings as something of a family heirloom and Yankees good-luck charm.
He recounted how he and Andrew would each put one on for "a special Yankee occasion," like the team's last World Series win in 2009. Giuliani testified that when Steinbrenner gave him the rings in 2002, he insisted on paying for them and told the owner, "These are for Andrew." He said he then invited his son—a teenager at the time—to take one for himself while he held the others for safekeeping. Giuliani testified that he decided to give the rest to Andrew at a birthday party in 2018. He estimated the rings, the same as the players received, were worth about $27,000.
The ex-mayor took his swings at a Dec. 27 deposition, a week before the start of a courtroom doubleheader in a tug-of-war over assets sought by the two former Georgia election workers who sued him over his lies about them in the wake of President-elect Trump's 2020 election loss. A transcript was posted to the court docket on Monday. Lawyers for the former election workers, mother and daughter Ruby Freeman and Wandrea "Shaye" Moss, argue that Giuliani has engaged in a "consistent pattern of willful defiance" of court orders to turn over items. In a Monday filing, lawyer Aaron Nathan said Giuliani's compliance has been spotty, noting that while he finally surrendered a Mercedes previously owned by actor Lauren Bacall, he failed to provide the vehicle's title. More here.
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