As the threat of civil contempt hangs over their client’s head, attorneys for Rudy Giuliani told a judge they want to stop representing him in a case involving a $148 million debt Giuliani owes to two election workers he defamed in 2020. Lawyers Kenneth Caruso and David Labowsky entered their withdrawal request on Wednesday, just ahead of a Friday deadline for Giuliani to surrender a number of valuable assets in order to chip away at the debt he now owes to Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss. The mother and daughter duo saw their lives completely upended after Giuliani smeared them publicly, insisting that they tried to steal the 2020 election from Donald Trump while working at the polls in Georgia.
The women sued Giuliani for defamation in 2021 and at trial they testified about the damage he did. The said they were forced to go into hiding and had received death threats, including vows to lynch them; Freeman was forced to move from her longtime home and give up on her small business out of concern for her safety; Moss’ son struggled in school as his mother’s name was dragged through the mud. Giuliani’s attorneys’ reasons for wanting to bail on him are not entirely clear, based on the heavily-redacted court filing.
However, there are some clues. Caruso cites a professional conduct rule that allows lawyers to withdraw from a case if the client “insists upon taking action with which the lawyer has a fundamental disagreement” or if the client “insists upon presenting a .
