Alex Jones’s Infowars Files for Bankruptcy
The conspiracy theorist and his companies are facing
lawsuits over his false claims about the Sandy Hook school shooting.
Last year, Alex Jones lost two defamation lawsuits
filed by families of Sandy Hook victims.
Derrick
Bryson Taylor
By Derrick
Bryson Taylor
April 18,
2022
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/18/us/alex-jones-infowars-bankruptcy.html?searchResultPosition=1
Three
companies affiliated with the far-right broadcaster and conspiracy theorist
Alex Jones, among them the media outlet Infowars, filed for Chapter 11
protection on Sunday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of
Texas, according to court documents.
Infowars is
facing multiple defamation lawsuits from families of victims of the 2012 Sandy
Hook school shooting, which Mr. Jones has claimed was a hoax. Two other companies
connected to Mr. Jones, IWHealth and Prison Planet TV, also filed for
bankruptcy protection on Sunday.
Last
September, Mr. Jones lost two defamation lawsuits filed in Texas by victims’
families because he failed to provide requested information to the court.
Months later, in a case representing the families of eight others killed in the
shooting, a Connecticut judge ruled that Mr. Jones was liable by default
because he had refused to turn over documents ordered by the courts, including
financial records. The rulings delivered sweeping victories to the families.
Mr. Jones
for years spread bogus theories that the shooting that killed 20 first graders
and six educators in Newtown, Conn., was part of a government-led plot to
confiscate Americans’ firearms and that the victims’ families were actors in
the scheme.
Because of
the falsehoods, families of the victims have found themselves routinely
accosted by those who believe those false claims. Among those are the parents
of Noah Pozner, who have moved nearly 10 times since the shooting, and live in
hiding.
The Sandy
Hook families maintain that Mr. Jones profited from spreading lies about their
relatives’ murders. Mr. Jones has disputed that, while for years failing to
produce sufficient records to bolster his claims.
Last month,
a Connecticut judge found the radio host in contempt for failing to sit for a
deposition and ordered that he be fined $25,000 for the first weekday he fails
to appear for testimony, with the fine rising by $25,000 every day thereafter
that he did not appear.
In trials
scheduled to begin this month in Texas, juries will determine how much Mr.
Jones must pay the families in damages. The Connecticut case is the last
scheduled trial, set to begin on Sept. 1.
In its
court filings, Infowars said that it had up to 49 creditors, as much as $50,000
in estimated assets and up to $10 million in estimated liabilities. The two
other companies said they also had up to 49 creditors, with IWHealth stating it
had up to $1 million in assets while Prison Planet TV said it had up to
$50,000.
Derrick
Bryson Taylor is a general assignment reporter. He previously worked at The New
York Post’s PageSix.com and Essence magazine.
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