New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Jones said he missed Sandy Hook deposition due to ‘a lot of stress’
NEWTOWN — Alex Jones suggests stress and the cardiovascular effects of his COVID-19 infection last year are why he skipped two court-ordered dates to give pretrial testimony in a defamation case he lost to eight Sandy
Hook families in Connecticut.
“I started getting sick after I got COVID last year…like everybody else, it attacked the cardiovascular system, okay?” Jones said in an audio message posted Friday on his Texas-based Infowars internet program. “I’m 48 and I’m under a lot of stress.”
Jones’ explanation for his absence last week for two days of depositions was backed up by his New Haven attorney Norm Pattis in court papers on Monday. Pattis implored a Connecticut judge to give Jones the same break as anyone else with health concerns in the COVID era and deny the families’ petition that Jones should be jailed until he testifies as he was ordered to by the court.
“Imposing sanctions, including the drastic step of arresting a litigant, would set a double standard that undoubtedly would raise questions about why Mr. Jones is being treated differently for listening to his doctors’ advice,” Pattis wrote.
“Here, the (families) have blatantly asked the court to substitute its judgment for that of Mr. Jones’ doctors.”
Pattis’ argument will be weighed on Wednesday by Superior Court Judge Barbara Bellis against arguments by an FBI agent and eight families that lost loved ones in the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre that Jones “plays sick when it is his turn to tell the truth under oath.”
“He begs his audience to send him money to support his legal defense and then ducks his deposition,” the families’ attorneys wrote to the judge on Friday.
Jones’ failure to appear for depositions and his subsequent broadcasts on Infowars last week that gave his side of the story and asked for money made national headlines in what continues to be one of the highest profile defamation cases of its kind in the country.
It is the latest development since Jones lost a defamation case by default in November after calling the 2012 mass shooting of 26 first-graders and educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School “staged,” “synthetic,” “manufactured,” “a giant hoax,” and “completely fake with actors.”
A similar process is further along in Texas, where Jones lost defamation cases by default to parents of two other victims of the Sandy Hook massacre. The first of two trials to award damages in Texas is planned for April 25.
In Connecticut, where a trial to award damages could begin as soon as August, Jones says he has every intention of complying with the deposition order once he gets medical clearance.
“I might have to go on some medication or whatever,” he said in a 10-minute audio clip. “It’s just the stress of this world.”
Jones added that he didn’t understand the need to be deposed prior to trial.
“I’m defaulted. I’m already guilty. Then why am I having to testify if I’m guilty?” Jones said. “And again I’m happy to go do that (deposition), it’s just that this isn’t the time for me to be doing that.”
Pattis further argued that Jones deserved no sanctions for skipping the depositions, because he had shown good faith.
“Mr. Jones ultimately heeded his doctors’ advice. He did not appear for the second day of his deposition because his doctors were actively working to determine whether he should be in the emergency room instead of that deposition,” Pattis wrote on Monday. “That is not bad faith. That is the same cautious approach that every member of society has taken through the COVID-19 pandemic, just in a different context.”