In the latest chapter of the ugly legal drama surrounding Alex Jones’ longstanding conspiracy claims, a Connecticut judge has frozen the broadcaster’s assets after ordering him to pay an additional $473 million in damages to families who lost loved ones in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School attack, as the Daily Wire reports.
Connecticut Superior Court Judge Barbara Bellis presided over the trial of Jones, a proceeding in which jurors had already ordered him to pay $965 million for falsely declaring the shooting rampage that killed 26 people, including 20 children, to have been a hoax designed to erode Second Amendment rights.
Judge adds whopping sum
This week, Bellis added a staggering sum of $473 onto Jones’ tab – a punitive damage award she said was wholly deserved and not at all excessive, as the Hartford Courant reported.
Though Jones contended that the eye-watering awards were certain to crush his business and that the goal of deterrence being pursued by the court could be achieved with a much smaller penalty, Bellis was having none of it.
In a 45-page order outlining her decision, Bellis wrote, “The record clearly supports the plaintiffs’ argument that the defendants’ conduct was intentional and malicious, and certain to cause harm by virtue of their infrastructure, ability to spread content, and massive audience… .”
“The record also establishes that the defendants repeated the conduct and attacks on the plaintiffs for nearly a decade, including during the trial, wanton, malicious, and heinous conduct that caused harm to the plaintiffs,” Bellis continued.
“This depravity, and cruel, persistent course of conduct by the defendants establishes the highest degree of reprehensibility and blameworthiness,” Bellis stated in support of the award’s shocking size.
Legal wrangling continues
An attorney representing families of the Sandy Hook victims, Christopher Mattei, lauded Bellis’ ruling after the fact, posting to social media, “Our hope is that this serves to reinforce the message of this case: those who profit from lies targeting the innocent will face justice.”
In addition to handing down the additional award of punitive damages, Bellis issued an order preventing Jones from moving assets out of the country as a means to skirt his mounting liabilities.
“With the exception of ordinary living expenses, the defendant Alex Jones is not to transfer, encumber, dispose, or move his assets out of the United States, until further order of the court,” wrote Bellis.
Attorneys for the plaintiffs, however, had hoped for an even more draconian order regarding Jones’ assets, however, and had sought the inclusion of language that would have compelled him to “bring all his moveable property, whether tangible or intangible, and assets to the state of Connecticut for attachment,” according to the Courant.
Lawyers for Jones have reportedly already initiated proceedings in hopes of setting aside the initial verdict or reducing the amount of damages already awarded, but given that he is also on the hook for millions in damages awarded by a Texas jury in August over the same Sandy Hook claims, it is clear that the controversial media figure has an extremely tough road ahead.