Arizona prosecutors have tried to serve disgraced former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani a summons for his part in MAGA's 2020 election interference scheme — but it's as if he's vanished into thin air.
For weeks now, investigators have tried to track down the former New York City mayor-turned-Trump toady, who was indicted last month in the Grand Canyon State for attempting "to prevent the lawful transfer of the presidency."
But trying to access him — e.g., visiting his apartment several times and making phone calls — has proved to be as grueling as Giuliani's "nightmare world" itself.
From The Washington Post:
The day after a grand jury handed down the indictment, [Arizona Attorney General spokesperson Richie] Taylor said two agents for the state attorney general traveled to New York City, where they hoped to hand-deliver the summons to Giuliani. The agents determined that Giuliani was in his New York apartment because he had recently video streamed from his residence, he said. …
A person at the building's front desk told the agents that they were not allowed to receive service of documents. The person did not dispute that Giuliani lived there, Taylor said.
The attorney general's office has also made multiple attempts to try to contact Giuliani by calling various phone numbers for him, "and none of them were successful," Taylor said.
A state grand jury indicted Giuliani and 17 others nearly three weeks ago in connection with an unsuccessful effort to award the state's 11 presidential electoral votes to Trump instead of Joe Biden, who won the election. All of the other defendants have been legally served, either directly or through their attorneys based in Arizona and elsewhere.
Giuliani's disappearing act might stave off his court appearance, but according to former U.S. attorney Paul Charlton, it could eventually lead to an arrest warrant. "You can think of a summons to appear as a courtesy by the prosecutors — it is an invitation to appear," he said, via The Washington Post.
"You can be held in contempt if you are served and fail to appear. But the alternative for prosecutors is to issue an arrest warrant, and that is, of course, a much more compelling vehicle," he added. "[T]he next step the prosecutors take won't be quite as gentle."
