Enterprise-Record (Chico)

Alex Jones files for personal bankruptcy

- By Dave Collins and Jill Bleed

Infowars host Alex Jones filed for personal bankruptcy protection Friday in Texas, citing debts that include nearly $1.5 billion he has been ordered to pay to families who sued him over his conspiracy theories about the Sandy Hook school massacre.

Jones filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in Houston. His filing listed $1 billion to $10 billion in liabilitie­s and $1 million to $10 million in assets.

Jones acknowledg­ed the filing on his Infowars broadcast, saying the case will prove that he’s broke and asking viewers to shop on his website to help keep the show on the air.

“I’m officially out of money, personally,” Jones said. “It’s all going to be filed. It’s all going to be public. And you will see that Alex Jones has almost no cash.”

Jones, who sells dietary supplement­s and other items on his Infowars site and promotes them during his shows, said he would not be commenting further on the bankruptcy.

For years, Jones described the 2012 massacre as a hoax. A Connecticu­t jury in October awarded victims’ families $965 million in compensato­ry damages, and a judge later tacked on another $473 million in punitive damages. Earlier in the year, a Texas jury awarded the parents of a child killed in the shooting $49 million in damages.

The bankruptcy filing temporaril­y halted all proceeding­s in the Connecticu­t case. A judge was forced to cancel a hearing scheduled for Friday on the Sandy Hook families’ request to secure the assets of Jones and his company to help pay the more than $1.4 billion in damages awarded there.

 ?? TYLER SIZEMORE — HEARST CONNECTICU­T MEDIA VIA AP, FILE ?? Infowars founder Alex Jones appears in court to testify during the Sandy Hook defamation damages trial at Connecticu­t Superior Court in Waterbury, Conn., on Sept. 22.
TYLER SIZEMORE — HEARST CONNECTICU­T MEDIA VIA AP, FILE Infowars founder Alex Jones appears in court to testify during the Sandy Hook defamation damages trial at Connecticu­t Superior Court in Waterbury, Conn., on Sept. 22.

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