Alex Jones pocketed more than $230,000 in one day by claiming the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre was a hoax, lawyers for victims’ families said Tuesday at the start of the conspiracy theorist’s second defamation trial.
The windfall came in 2014 when Jones’ Infowars website published a story claiming the FBI had said no one died in the shooting where 26 kids and teachers were killed, attorney Christopher Mattei said during opening statements, the News-Times reported.
The right-wing host was “preying on people who are helpless,” Mattei told the jury in Waterbury, Connecticut.
The new trial stems from a lawsuit filed by parents of some of the young Sandy Hook victims who claim Jones’ repeated lies that the horrific massacre never happened caused them significant pain and suffering.
A jury of three men and three women will decide how much Jones owes the relatives of the eight victims, as well as an FBI agent who responded to the Newtown school.
Last month, Alex Jones was found liable for spreading wild claims about the shootings in another Sandy Hook trial in Texas. Briana Sanchez/Austin American-Statesman via AP
Last month, Jones was found liable for spreading wild claims about the shootings in another Sandy Hook trial in Texas, with grieving parents awarded nearly $50 million in damages for being subjected to the cruel claims for years.
Jones, 48, now claims he does accept that the shooting took place.
But Mattei said Tuesday that Jones was nothing but a bully who put the elementary school parents through a nightmare of pain and anguish.
“Unless you stop a bully, a bully will never stop himself,” he told the jury.
Mattei said Jones and those at his Infowars brand “knew the harassment was happening, but the lies were too profitable.”
Jones repeatedly preached to his audience that the shooting, which left 26 children and educators dead not 20 miles from the courtroom, never actually happened.
Sandy Hook families arrive together at Waterbury Superior Court on Tuesday morning. Carol Kaliff/Hearst Connecticut Media via APShooter Adam Lanza, who killed his mother, Nancy, before the massacre, later took his own life as police moved in, authorities said.
During his opening statements, Jones’ attorney told jurors that lawyers for Sandy Hook families were more concerned with making a political statement.
“This trial is not a cultural comment,” attorney Norm Pattis said. “It was 35 minutes in before the word ‘damages’ even arose.
“They transformed money into a political weapon in this trial,” Pattis said.
Connecticut State Police lead a line of children from the Sandy Hook Elementary School following the mass shooting on Dec. 14, 2012. Shannon Hicks/New Town Bee/PolarisJones was not in the courtroom on Tuesday for the start of the trial, which is expected to last about four weeks, officials said.
With Post wires
