The $150 million figure, proposed by the parents’ attorney, Mark Bankston, represents the first time the family of a Sandy Hook victim has put a dollar amount on the suffering Mr. Jones and his Infowars website and broadcast, based in Austin, was prompted by spreading lies about the Dec. 14, 2012, shooting in Newtown, Conn., that killed 20 first-graders and six teachers. The dollar amount, while large, was appropriate, Mr. Bankston said, calling Mr. Jones’ false allegations “the most vile and despicable campaign of defamation and slander in American history.” Mr. Jones, who was in the courtroom for opening statements from both sides on Tuesday, was visibly upset by the proposed award. During a break he erupted in anger in the corridor outside the courtroom, calling the proceedings a “show trial” and calling it a “disastrous, utter, total and complete travesty”. Before the trial began, Mr. Jones momentarily placed duct tape over his mouth bearing the Infowars.com logo and the words “Save the 1st,” a reference to the First Amendment. Mr Jones put the tape of her slogan down on the table in front of him during opening statements in front of the jury as he shook his head in disagreement with Mr Bankston’s remarks. He was sitting a few feet away from Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, the parents of the child killed at Sandy Hook, Jesse Lewis, 6. The trial is the first of three in which jurors will decide how much to award the families of the victims. In this first trial, Mr. Heslin and Ms. Lewis are set to testify about the ordeal they have endured since Mr. Jones suggested on his show in 2017 that Mr. Heslin’s televised recollection of Jesse’s body shortly after the shooting was false. Since then, the family has suffered years of accusations and threats. Leonard Pozner and Veronique De La Rosa, the parents of Noah Pozner, the youngest Sandy Hook victim, are scheduled to testify at a second trial in September in Austin. That same month, the families of eight other Sandy Hook victims will testify at the third trial, in Connecticut. The trials come after the families of the 10 victims won defamation suits against Mr Jones last year, when judges ruled he was by default liable for repeatedly failing to provide court-ordered documents and evidence. Those decisions set the stage for this summer’s trials, in which juries will award monetary damages to the families as a result of their victories.
The Sandy Hook School Massacre
Card 1 of 5 A devastating attack. On December 14, 2012, a 20-year-old gunman killed his mother and then entered the elementary school armed with semi-automatic handguns and a semi-automatic rifle. There he killed 26 people, 20 of them children, before killing himself. The push for gun control. Then-President Barack Obama vowed to “use every power in this office” to stop such massacres from happening again. Although legislative efforts to pass an assault weapons ban and expand background checks failed, a new wave of activism focused on gun control gained traction after the shooting. Mr. Jones’s lawyer, Federico Reynal, suggested during jury selection on Monday that he would ask jurors to award the parents a single dollar in damages, in part because the additional trauma caused by Mr. Jones paled so much. compared to the death of their parents. son. Mr. Bankston said in a statement Tuesday that the $150 million award represented a dollar for parents’ reputations and a dollar for their emotional damage for each of the one-quarter of Americans who said in a Fairleigh Dickinson University survey on 2013 that he thought the Sandy Hook shooting was definitely or possibly faked. “For 10 years, Mr. Jones robbed Neil and Scarlett of the time they needed to heal from the violent death of their son Jesse because Mr. Jones wanted to sell more of his products,” she said. “This is a huge verdict, to be sure, but it’s a verdict that will do justice to the level of harm that was done in this case.” Mr Raynal began his opening speech by calling Mr Bankston’s presentation a “conspiracy of lies”. “It is an honor to represent Alex Jones” and his business, Mr. Reynal said. “He is one of the most polarizing figures in this nation,” who had been “rescinded, punished for statements related to this case.” Mr. Reynal repeated Mr. Jones’ long-standing claim that he was only echoing the false claims of others, including members of his Infowars audience. In fact, Mr. Jones spread false claims about the shooting on his show only hours after the incident. Mr. Reynal also supported a claim made by others who have been sued for spreading political lies, including falsehoods about the 2020 election: that a claim, no matter how inflammatory or wild, is not defamatory if the person making it does he believe to be true , or, as Mr Jones claimed, they cannot tell the truth from a lie because they have been misled by what Mr Reynal called “the lies of the mainstream media”. Travis County District Court Judge Maya Guerra Gamble repeatedly warned Mr. Jones’ lawyers not to challenge his First Amendment right to make false allegations because he had already forfeited his right to trial in the defamation suits. The proposed $150 million award would be for damages only, Mr. Bankston said. The jury will also decide whether to award punitive damages. Mr. Jones has grossed more than $50 million a year in recent years, selling nutritional supplements, conspiracy-focused videos and books, body armor and doomsday prep equipment on his shows. Mr. Bankston aims to introduce records released by Infowars during preparations for the trial, indicating that Mr. Jones’ broadcasts about Sandy Hook had caused an increase in the audience and sales of Infowars products. The Sandy Hook families say they have a broader goal: They want the trials to warn Americans about the growing damage being done to vulnerable people and civic life by viral political lies, whether false theories denying mass shootings or bogus claims about a stolen election of 2020 that brought violence to the Capitol on January 6, 2021. “This is about creating change,” Mr Bankston told the jury on Tuesday. “You have the power to prevent this from happening again.” Mr. Jones, an ally of former President Donald J. Trump, who live-streamed the January 6 attack as it unfolded, is under scrutiny for his role in planning events surrounding the insurgency.
