Sandy Hook Shooting Victims’ Families Win Legal Victory Against Alex Jones, InfoWars
Six families of victims of the Sandy Hook shooting won a legal battle against Alex Jones and InfoWars Friday after a judge ruled that the far-right conspiracy site must hand over internal marketing and financial documents as part of an ongoing lawsuit against InfoWars and its host.
The judge overseeing the case will also decide next week whether the plaintiffs’ lawyers can depose Jones, who is accused of repeatedly calling the 2012 shooting at the Newtown, Connecticut elementary school where 27 people were killed a “hoax.”
“From the beginning, we have alleged that Alex Jones and his financial network trafficked in lies and hate in order to profit from the grief of Sandy Hook families. That is what we intend to prove, and today’s ruling advances our effort,” the plantiffs’ attorney Christopher Mattei said Friday in a statement (via the Hartford Courant).
“We look forward to gaining access to Infowars’ internal marketing and financial documents to show that Jones has built an empire as nothing more than a conspiracy profiteer, as alleged in our complaint.”
The plaintiffs previously said Jones and InfoWars engaged in a “years-long campaign of abusive and outrageous false statements in which Jones and the other defendants have developed, amplified and perpetuated claims that the Sandy Hook massacre was staged and that the 26 families who lost loved ones that day are paid actors who faked their relative’s deaths,” resulting in “physical confrontations and harassment, death threats and personal attacks on social media” for victims’ families, ABC News reports.
As part of Friday’s ruling, Jones must hand over “business and marketing plans for Infowars, contracts between Infowars and organizations such as Facebook and Twitter, and all communications and/or documents, including letters, memos, emails, text messages, instant messenger logs, regarding Sandy Hook, crisis actors, shooter Adam Lanza and mass shootings,” the Hartford Courant added.
Jones’ lawyer Jay M. Wolman had previously attempted to have the lawsuit – one of several against Jones from families of Sandy Hook victims’ families – dismissed, citing the controversial radio host’s “First Amendment protected speech.”
In recent months, Jones’ InfoWars empire has been removed from social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook, Spotify and Apple’s podcast hub.