Judge to weigh Alex Jones’ ability to pay
Sandy Hook families await $1.5B
NEWTOWN — A federal judge in Texas will decide how much the bankrupted Alex Jones can pay of the $1.5 billion he owes Sandy Hook families in defamation damages, starting with a courtroom conference on Wednesday in Houston.
And while the bankruptcy judge may determine sooner rather than later whether Jones has a few million dollars to his name as Jones claims, or whether Jones’ assets are worth closer to several hundred million dollars as an expert testified at a defamation awards trial earlier this year, the Sandy Hook families may have to wait until Jones’ appeals are decided before any money is distributed.
Meanwhile, what happens to Jones’ Infowars conspiracy news and marketing platform, which brought in at least $76 million in 2019, remains to be seen.Jones’ biggest fear about filing for personal bankruptcy was that it would damage his credibility as a leading broadcast conspiracist, and the sales of his supplements would suffer, his representative said.
On Friday — the same day Jones filed for personal bankruptcy in a Houston court, claiming he had no more than $10 million, Jones briefly mentioned his financial crisis during a call-in segment of his Infowars show.
“It’s important to understand that the battle to take us off the air has nothing to do with Sandy Hook, nothing to do with stuff the media’s taken and blown up out of context,” Jones said.
Instead, he claimed it was an attempt to “take everybody off the air” who would oppose a “globalist, New World Order Great Reset.” The Anti-Defamation League describes the “Great Reset” as a conspiracy theory that claims “global elites” have a plan to “destroy American sovereignty and prosperity, among other allegations.
In a two-paragraph article on the Infowars website entitled “Alex Jones Breaks Down the Future of Infowars Amid New Bankruptcy Filing,” Jones referred viewers to a crowd-funding platform to donate to his legal fund.
As of Friday afternoon, the campaign had raised $293,000 of a $500,000 goal, noting that donations would be “received by Pattis & Smith, LLC.”
Norm Pattis, Jones’ high-profile on-again, offagain lead attorney in Connecticut, told a state Superior Court judge on Friday that Jones’ bankruptcy filing would not necessarily stall all lower court actions — especially Jones’ arguments to set aside a $965 million jury verdict for eight Sandy Hook families and an FBI agent against Jones in October — and to appeal if that argument fails.
Jones also plans to appeal a $49 million verdict against him in August that a Texas jury awarded to the parents of a slain Sandy Hook boy who Jones defamed.
Jones faces a third trial in Texas where a jury will determine how much Jones must pay the parents of another slain Sandy Hook boy Jones defamed.
Jones, who called the 2012 massacre of 26 first graders and educators at Sandy Hook School “staged,” “synthetic,” “manufactured,” “a giant hoax,” and “completely fake with actors,” was ordered to pay the Sandy Hook families in Connecticut another $473 million in punitive damages and attorney fees by Judge Barbara Bellis in early November.
Jones’ third and most consequential bankruptcy filing this year comes just days before the 10th anniversary of the Sandy Hook tragedy on Dec. 14.
Judge Christopher Lopez, the federal bankruptcy judge from Texas’ southern district, has presided over Jones’ two other bankruptcy filings this year of companies Jones owns.Jones’ first bankruptcy filing of three shell companies on the eve of his first trial in Texas earlier this year was later dismissed. Jones second bankruptcy filing of his parent company Free Speech Systems is pending before Lopez.One of the first actions Lopez is expected to take up is a motion by Jones to consolidate his FSS bankruptcy with his personal bankruptcy.