Hunter Biden Sues Rudy Giuliani Over Hacked ‘Laptop’
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Hunter Biden has filed a lawsuit against Rudy Giuliani and his former attorney Robert Costello, accusing the pair of being among those “primarily responsible for what has been described as the ‘total annihilation,’” of Biden’s digital privacy, and violating digital privacy laws in the process.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in California’s Central District Court, alleges that Giuliani and Costello, “dedicated an extraordinary amount of time and energy toward looking for, hacking into, tampering with, manipulating, copying, disseminating, and generally obsessing over data that they were given that was taken or stolen from [Biden’s] devices or storage platforms, including what Defendants claim to have obtained from [Biden’s] alleged ‘laptop’ computer.”
The filing clarifies that the so-called “laptop” obtained by Giuliani, the contents of which have fueled years of Republican conspiracies, innuendo, and gross exploitation of Biden’s, personal data was not in fact a physical laptop. “It is, according to their own public statements, an ‘external drive’ that Defendants were told contained hundreds of gigabytes of [Biden’s] personal data.” The lawsuit alleges that the data provided to Giuliani on the drive was tampered with both before Giuliani received it, and after it was in his possession.
Biden’s attorney requested a jury trial and is seeking punitive damages and restitution from Giuliani and Costello.
Ted Goodman, an advisor to Giuliani, said in a statement provided to Rolling Stone that “Hunter Biden has previously refused to admit ownership of the laptop. I’m not surprised he’s now falsely claiming his laptop hard drive was manipulated by Mayor Giuliani, considering the sordid material and potential evidence of crimes on that thing.”
The lawsuit is the latest in a myriad of legal battles faced by Giuliani, who in August was indicted and arrested in Georgia alongside former President Donald Trump in a sprawling election interference case. In September, Giuliani was sued by his former attorneys — including Costello — for non-payment of almost $1.4 million in outstanding legal bills.
Hunter Biden himself is currently under criminal indictment. Last week, he pleaded not guilty to three federal charges related to unlawfully purchasing and possessing a firearm while under the influence of narcotics.
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