What’s next for Alex Jones after $49M Sandy Hook verdict?
Associated Press
August 10, 2022
DALLAS — The nearly $50 million defamation verdict against Alex Jones for his years of lies about the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre is far from a final reckoning.
Jones’ attorneys plan to appeal and try to lower the price tag a Texas jury put on his false claim that the nation’s deadliest school shooting — which killed 20 students and six teachers — was a hoax. The conspiracy theorist faces bankruptcy and other defamation lawsuits. And the courtroom conduct of Jones and his lawyers has exposed the Infowars host to new legal perils, including possible sanctions, allegations of perjury and renewed scrutiny in the investigation of the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
Here’s a look at the fallout from the successful suit against Jones by the parents of one of the child victims in the Dec. 14, 2012, shooting at the school in Newtown, Connecticut.
WILL JONES PAY AND HOW MUCH?
A Travis County jury last week ordered Jones to pay Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis $4.1 million in compensatory damages for the suffering he put them through by saying the shooting that killed their 6-year-old son, Jesse Lewis, was staged to increase gun controls. The jurors also leveled $45.2 million in punitive damages against Jones, bringing the total fine to roughly a third of the $150 million the couple had sought.
It’s the first time Jones has been held financially liable for repeatedly claiming the Sandy Hook shooting was faked. Lewis said after the trial that Jones had been held accountable. His lawyers plan to appeal and to seek to reduce the damages.
It’s the first time Jones has been held financially liable for repeatedly claiming the Sandy Hook shooting was faked. Lewis said after the trial that Jones had been held accountable. His lawyers plan to appeal and to seek to reduce the damages.
Legal experts say Jones probably won’t pay the full amount.
In most civil cases, Texas law limits how much defendants have to pay in “exemplary,” or punitive, damages to twice the “economic damages” plus up to $750,000. But jurors are not told about this cap, and eye-popping verdicts are often hacked down by judges.
Russ Horton, an Austin attorney, said it’s “almost a surety” that the damages against Jones will be cut to conform with the law, either by an appeals court or the trial judge.
A Virginia judge did just that in Johnny Depp’s defamation lawsuit against his ex-wife, Amber Heard. Under a cap similar to Texas’ law, the judge in July cut the $10 million in compensatory damages that a jury awarded Depp to $350,000.
What Jones can afford is also disputed.
He testified that any award over $2 million would “sink us,” and Free Speech Systems — which is Infowars’ Austin-based parent company — filed for bankruptcy protection during the first week of the trial.
But economist Bernard Pettingill testified that Jones and his company are worth up to $270 million. He said Jones withdrew $62 million from the firm in 2021, when default judgments were issued in that case and two other Sandy Hook defamation suits.
Since the verdict, Jones has urged Infowars’ supporters to buy the nutritional supplements, survival gear and other products he sells, saying he needs funds to continue the show and his legal fights.
“If we don’t get solvent and get enough money to come out of this bankruptcy, they’ll appoint a receiver and start selling off the equipment,” he said Monday.
1 comment:
That is who he is, that is what he does.
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