Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones was found guilty of two defamation lawsuits after pushing the lie that the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting was a "false flag" operation carried out by "crisis actors."
"Judge Maya Guerra Gamble on Monday issued her ruling for default judgments against Jones in two different cases, which means he and the conspiracy-theory-spewing outlet Infowars have been found liable for all damages and a jury will now be convened to determine how much he will owe the plaintiffs," Sebastian Murdock reported for HuffPost.
The rulings against the InfoWars host were made public on Thursday.
"The ruling — which is often referred to in Texas as a 'death penalty sanction' for a party unwilling to comply with court orders — is a rarity in the legal world. Jones, who is now on his seventh lawyer in these cases, had years to provide documentation requested by the court, including internal company emails," HuffPost reported.
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The lawsuits were brought by Leonard Pozner and Veronique De La Rosa, whose 6-year-old son Noah was killed in the shooting and Scarlett Lewis, whose 6-year-old son, Jesse was also among the 20 children killed. Six adults were also murdered in the mass shooting.
"In total, nine families who lost loved ones in the Sandy Hook shooting have leveled lawsuits against Jones and Infowars for the damage he and his outlet caused. Since then, Jones has lost multiple legal battles in his many lawsuits and was ordered to pay nearly $150,000 in legal fees in 2020 for failing to provide discovery documents for the plaintiffs," HuffPost reported.
In 2018, the watchdog group Media Matters for America created a video documenting the conspiracy theories Jones pushed about the school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut.
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