Giuliani Must Pay $1.3 Million to Former Lawyers, Judge Rules

A New York State judge this week ruled that Rudolph W. Giuliani must pay more than $1.3 million to lawyers who represented him in numerous criminal investigations stemming from his work for President Trump.

The ruling by the judge, Arthur F. Engoron, was the latest of many legal and financial misfortunes to befall Mr. Giuliani, the 81-year-old former New York City mayor. In the past two years alone, he has been indicted and accused of seeking to overturn the 2020 presidential election; filed for bankruptcy under the strain of legal bills; been disbarred in New York and Washington and, last month, suffered a fractured vertebra in a New Hampshire car crash.

The Tuesday ruling by Justice Engoron came in a particularly painful proceeding for the former mayor. It was the result of a 2023 lawsuit filed by Mr. Giuliani’s former lawyer and friend, Robert J. Costello, and Mr. Costello’s former law firm, Davidoff Hutcher & Citron.

“This is only about collecting a legal fee. There’s no politics,” said Larry Hutcher, a co-founder of the firm. “We’re obviously very grateful that the court recognized that we were entitled to be paid for the services we rendered.”

While it remains unclear what money or assets Mr. Giuliani has left, Mr. Hutcher emphasized that the firm would pursue the judgment.

“We’re not going away,” he said, adding, “We intend to collect on the debt.”

Mr. Costello declined to comment. A spokesman and a lawyer for Mr. Giuliani did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Mr. Costello represented Mr. Giuliani in various criminal investigations related to Mr. Giuliani’s work as a personal lawyer to President Trump. They included an inquiry by Manhattan federal prosecutors, another by Georgia state prosecutors and a third by Washington prosecutors looking into the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Mr. Costello also defended Mr. Giuliani in more than 10 lawsuits, and represented him when his license to practice law was challenged in New York and Washington. In August 2023, The New York Times reported that Mr. Giuliani, with Mr. Costello’s assistance, was seeking to recover legal fees that he believed Mr. Trump owed him.

At the time, Mr. Trump largely refused to pay, though he did host a fund-raiser on Mr. Giuliani’s behalf at his Bedminster, N.J., golf club that September.

Mr. Costello broke with the former mayor, saying he had refused to pay his legal bills, and filed the suit with his firm. In its complaint, the firm said that Mr. Giuliani had paid only $214,000 of a $1,574,196.10 legal bill, leaving more than 85 percent unpaid.

Mr. Giuliani, who for a time served as his own lawyer in the proceeding, denied having received the invoices and moved to dismiss the lawsuit.

But in his ruling on Tuesday, Justice Engoron noted that when Mr. Costello had texted Mr. Giuliani telling him that he owed more than $1 million in legal fees, Mr. Giuliani did not question the amount, and did not say he had not received the bills. Instead, he appeared to change the subject, replying, “Any news?”

The judge ruled that Mr. Giuliani’s claim that he had never received the bills had failed. He ordered Mr. Giuliani to pay $1,360,196.10 plus interest dating from October 2023, the month after he was sued.

Mr. Giuliani, a former Manhattan U.S. attorney who was once worth tens of millions of dollars, has seen his fortunes reversed since Mr. Trump’s first term in the White House. His 2019 divorce from his third wife, Judith Nathan, was expensive, and he found it difficult to make money with his law licenses under threat.

This year, he settled a separate lawsuit for an undisclosed sum, after having been ordered to pay $11 million to two election workers who he repeatedly and falsely claimed had helped to steal the 2020 presidential election. The settlement allowed him to retain some of his most valuable possessions, including a vintage Mercedes-Benz convertible and a 10-room apartment on the Upper East Side.

This month, President Trump said he would award Mr. Giuliani the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He called Mr. Giuliani “the greatest mayor in the history of New York City, and an equally great American Patriot.”

Ben Protess contributed reporting.