Written by Jack Queen
(Reuters) – The Connecticut Court of Appeals on Friday awarded nearly $1.3 billion in defamation claims against conspiracy theorist Alex Jones in a lawsuit accusing him of spreading lies about the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting. The judgment was generally upheld.
A three-judge panel of the Connecticut Court of Appeals ruled that an October 2022 jury decision to award $965 million in damages and attorney fees to the families of the shooting victims The court ruled that this was not unreasonable considering the emotional distress they had suffered as a result of Jones’ lies about the incident. Sandy Hook.
In upholding the verdict, the justices found fault only in the portion that awarded $150 million in damages under the state’s unfair trade laws, and threw out that portion because it did not properly apply to the facts of the case. I decided that it should be done.
Jones has long argued that the 2012 shooting deaths of 20 students and six staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., was staged by actors as part of a government plot to steal guns from Americans. was making a point. Mr. Jones later admitted that the shooting had taken place, but the plaintiffs argued that Mr. Jones spent years cashing in on lies about the massacre.
Sandy Hook family attorney Alinor Sterling praised the ruling.
“The jury’s $965 million reprimand against Jones stands, and thanks to his family’s many years of bravery, Alex Jones is one step closer to true justice,” Sterling said in a statement. .
Mr. Jones’ attorney, Norm Pattis, said in a statement that the jury was wrongly led to believe that Mr. Jones made millions of dollars from the Sandy Hook conspiracy theory and that he was responsible for his family’s suffering.
“We were hoping that the appellate court would see through the farce this case had become, but that wasn’t the case,” Pattis said, adding that he plans to appeal to the Connecticut Supreme Court. added.
Jones and Free Speech Systems, the parent company of his site Infowars, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2022 following separate rulings in Connecticut and Texas A jury in the case awarded a $49 million verdict to other Sandy Hook parents.
In November, the Onion parody news website announced it would buy Infowars in a bankruptcy auction, but the loser linked to Mr. Jones is contesting the sale.
A bankruptcy judge will consider whether to approve Onion’s acquisition of Infowars at a court hearing in Houston on Monday.
