Judge: Alex Jones’ fine starts in Sandy Hook case

NEWTOWN — A fine that can escalate into six figures within days began on Friday for the embattled Infowars host

Alex Jones after a Connecticut judge overseeing the defamation case he lost to eight Sandy Hook families denied his request to lift the sanction while he appeals.

State Superior Court Judge Barbara Bellis said the escalating $25,000 daily fine in response to Jones defying her orders to answer questions under oath last week would stand, even though Jones said in court papers that he would sit for two days of depositions starting

April 11.

If Jones does travel to Connecticut to answer pretrial questions in the Bridgeport offices of the families’ attorneys, he can apply to the court for a refund, Bellis said.

“[S]hould Mr. Jones choose to purge the contempt, as this motion suggests may be the case, he can move the court to return the funds,” Bellis wrote in a 100word order on Friday.

If Jones holds to that schedule, his running fine total as of April 11 would be $525,000.

Norm Pattis, the New Haven attorney representing Jones in his Connecticut defamation case, would not comment directly on Bellis’ ruling.

“We will turn to the appellate courts for relief,” Pattis said.

On Thursday, Pattis had asked Bellis to “stay” her fine while Jones awaits the results of an appeal to the Connecticut Supreme Court. In the appeal, Pattis calls Bellis’ fine an “extraordinary order (that) works a substantial injustice.”

The Bridgeport attorneys representing the FBI agent and 14 people from eight families that lost loved ones in the Sandy

Hook massacre disagreed.

“Last week, Alex Jones chose to go on the air rather than go under oath,” wrote the families’ attorneys from Koskoff, Koskoff and Bieder on Friday morning, before the judge’s ruling. “The escalating fines were imposed to compel his appearance and should not be set aside merely because Mr. Jones has yet again said he will appear.”

Jones himself said he did not appear for court-ordered depositions because he was dealing with cardiovascular symptoms from a 2021 COVID-19 infection and was “under a lot of stress.”

Jones, who lost three defamation cases in Texas and Connecticut after he called the slaying of 26 first-graders and educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School “staged,” “synthetic,” “manufactured,” “a giant hoax,” and “completely fake with actors,” faces three jury trials to determine damages.

The first two trials will be in Texas, beginning on April 25. The Connecticut trial will start on Aug. 2.

Jones made national headlines earlier this week when he offered four Sandy Hook parents in the two Texas cases and the 15 people in the Connecticut case $120,000 each to settle. The Connecticut families rejected the offer. The families in the Texas cases have not responded, although one Sandy Hook father said this week that he would fight Jones at the trial.

The parents’ lead attorney in Texas would not comment on the settlement offer on Friday, except to say that he was ready for trial.

“I can guarantee you 100 percent that this going to trial,” said Mark Bankston.