Parents of Sandy Hook Victim at Alex Jones Trial Seek $150 Million in Damages

AUSTIN, Texas — Legal professionals for the mother and father of a kid killed within the Sandy Hook college taking pictures instructed a jury right here on Tuesday that the conspiracy broadcaster Alex Jones ought to pay them $150 million for claiming that they have been complicit in a authorities plot to faux the taking pictures as a pretext for gun management efforts.

The $150 million determine, proposed by the mother and father’ lawyer, Mark Bankston, represents the primary time the household of a Sandy Hook sufferer has put a greenback determine on the struggling Mr. Jones and his Infowars web site and broadcast, based mostly in Austin, brought on by spreading lies in regards to the Dec. 14, 2012, shootings in Newtown, Conn., which killed 20 first graders and 6 educators.

The greenback quantity, whereas giant, was appropriate, Mr. Bankston stated, calling Mr. Jones’s false claims “essentially the most despicable and vile marketing campaign of defamation and slander in American historical past.”

Mr. Jones, who was within the courtroom for each side’ opening statements Tuesday, was visibly unnerved by the proposed award. Throughout a break he exploded in anger within the hall outdoors the courtroom, calling the proceedings a “present trial” and deeming them a “Structure-destroying, absolute, complete and full travesty.”

Earlier than the trial started Mr. Jones momentarily positioned a size of duct tape over his mouth bearing the Infowars.com emblem and the phrases “Save the first,” a reference to the First Modification. Mr. Jones laid the tape with its slogan down on the desk in entrance of him throughout the opening statements, in view of the jury, whereas shaking his head in disagreement with Mr. Bankston’s remarks.

He was seated just a few ft away from Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, the mother and father of the kid killed at Sandy Hook, Jesse Lewis, 6.

The trial is the primary of three during which juries will determine how a lot to award the households of the victims in damages. On this first trial, Mr. Heslin and Ms. Lewis are to testify in regards to the torment they’ve suffered since Mr. Jones implied on his present in 2017 that Mr. Heslin’s televised recollection of cradling Jesse’s physique shortly after the taking pictures was false. The household has since endured years of accusations and threats.

Leonard Pozner and Veronique De La Rosa, the mother and father of Noah Pozner, the youngest Sandy Hook sufferer, are scheduled to testify at a second trial in September in Austin. That very same month, the households of eight different Sandy Hook victims will testify on the third trial, in Connecticut.

The trials come after the households of the ten victims received defamation lawsuits towards Mr. Jones final 12 months, when judges dominated that he was liable by default for repeatedly failing to offer court-ordered paperwork and testimony. These rulings set the stage for this summer season’s trials, during which juries will award financial damages to the households because of their victories.

Mr. Jones’s lawyer, Federico Reynal, urged throughout jury choice on Tuesday that he would ask the jurors to award the mother and father a single greenback in damages, partly as a result of the extra trauma brought on by Mr. Jones paled so drastically compared to the demise of their son.

Mr. Bankston stated in his assertion on Tuesday that the $150 million award symbolized one greenback for the mother and father’ reputational injury and one greenback for his or her emotional injury for every of the one-quarter of People who stated in a 2013 Fairleigh Dickinson College survey that they thought the Sandy Hook taking pictures was positively or probably faked.

“For ten years, Mr. Jones has robbed Neil and Scarlett of the time they wanted to heal over the violent demise of their son Jesse, as a result of Mr. Jones needed to promote extra of his merchandise,” he stated. “That may be a large verdict, to make certain, however it’s one that may do justice to the extent of hurt carried out on this case.”

Mr. Reynal started his opening remarks by calling Mr. Bankston’s presentation “a conspiracy of lies.”

“I’m honored to characterize Alex Jones” and his enterprise, Mr. Reynal stated. “He is without doubt one of the most polarizing figures on this nation,” who had been “canceled, punished for statements associated to this case.”

Mr. Reynal repeated Mr. Jones’s long-held declare that he was solely echoing the false claims of others, together with members of his Infowars viewers. In actual fact, Mr. Jones unfold false claims in regards to the taking pictures on his broadcast solely hours after the occasion.

Mr. Reynal additionally superior a declare made by others who’ve been sued for spreading political lies, together with falsehoods in regards to the 2020 election: {that a} declare, regardless of how incendiary or wild, just isn’t defamatory if the individual making it believes it to be true, or, as Mr. Jones has claimed, they’ll’t inform fact from falsehood as a result of they been misled by what Mr. Reynal known as “mainstream media lies.”

Travis County District Court docket Choose Maya Guerra Gamble repeatedly cautioned Mr. Jones’s legal professionals that they weren’t litigating his First Modification proper to make the false claims, as a result of he had already forfeited his proper to a trial within the defamation fits.

The proposed $150 million award could be for compensatory damages solely, Mr. Bankston stated. The jury will even determine on whether or not to award punitive damages. Mr. Jones has achieved revenues of greater than $50 million yearly in recent times, promoting weight loss plan dietary supplements, conspiracy-focused movies and books, physique armor and doomsday preparation gear on his broadcasts. Mr. Bankston goals to current information launched by Infowars throughout preparations for the trial indicating that Mr. Jones’s broadcasts about Sandy Hook had prompted Infowars’ viewers and product gross sales to surge.

The Sandy Hook households say they’ve a broader objective: They need the trials to alert People to the mounting injury carried out to susceptible folks and civic life by viral political lies, whether or not bogus theories denying mass shootings or false claims of a stolen 2020 election that introduced violence to the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

“This a case about creating change,” Mr. Bankston instructed the jury on Tuesday. “You will have the ability to cease this from ever occurring once more.”

Mr. Jones, an ally of former President Donald J. Trump who broadcast the Jan. 6 assault reside because it unfolded, is beneath scrutiny for his function in planning occasions surrounding the riot.