Remember when Infowars founder Alex Jones went around spreading lies and saying that the 2012 Sandy Hook elementary school shooting was a hoax and that parents in unspeakable pain were paid actors? Yeah, that horrible human being is going to pay and pay and pay.
A jury decided on Wednesday that Jones will pay $965 million for all the lies he told and all the pain he exacerbated.
The money will go directly to family members who lost a child in the shooting and to an FBI agent who was harassed by Jones’ listeners.
Family members said they were tortured by strangers who were inspired by Jones’ rhetoric on his webcasts. They said their harassers were totally convinced by Jones that the school shooting that took their children’s lives was a con ordered by Democrats in order to make a case for stricter gun control.
Christopher Mattei, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said Jones created a “lie machine” for profit at the expense of grieving parents: “He knew his army was coming after them. Every single one of these families was drowning in grief and Alex Jones put his foot right on top of them.”
Jones said he was done saying sorry for all of the hurt he caused, busting out in court that “I’ve already said I’m sorry hundreds of times, and I’m done saying I’m sorry.”
Jurors were tasked with deciding how much money Jones will owe his victims in damages. After a separate jury in Texas decided in August that he will pay nearly $50 million in damages to the parents of one of the children killed in the shooting, Jones is now responsible for paying a combined total of just over $1 billion.
While Texas has a law capping damages in civil suits, no such law exists in Connecticut.
On air, Jones said he would not pay anything.
