AUSTIN, TX-
A Texas jury on Thursday ordered conspiracy theorist Alex Jones to pay more than $4 million in compensatory damages to the parents of a 6-year-old boy who was killed in the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, marking the first time the Infowars host has been held financially responsible for repeatedly claiming the deadliest school shooting in US history was a hoax.
The Austin jury has yet to decide how much the Infowars host should pay in punitive damages to Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, whose son Jesse Lewis was among 20 children and six educators who were killed in the 2012 attack in Newtown, Connecticut.
The parents had sought at least $150 million in compensation for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Jones’ lawyer asked the jury to limit damages to $8 – one dollar for each of the compensation charges considered – and Jones himself said any award over $2 million would “sink us”. .
This likely won’t be the final judgment against Jones over his claims that the attack was staged to increase gun control. A Connecticut judge ruled against him in a similar lawsuit brought by the families of other victims and an FBI agent who worked on the case.
The Texas price could set a marker for further cases against Jones and underscore the financial threat he faces. It also raises new questions about the ability of Infowars – which has been banned from YouTube, Spotify and Twitter for hate speech – to continue operating, although the company’s finances remain unclear.
Jones conceded during the trial that the attack was real and that he was wrong to lie about it. But Heslin and Lewis told jurors an apology would not be enough and called on them to make Jones pay for the years of pain he caused them and the other Sandy Hook families.
Jones’ media company, Free Speech Systems, which is the parent company of Infowars, filed for bankruptcy during the two-week trial.
ctvnews
