Texas court cuts Alex Jones's Sandy Hook damages from $50m to $1.5m
A Texas appeals court has reduced a judgment against Infowars founder Alex Jones over his false claims that the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting was a hoax from $50m to $1.5m. The ruling does not affect a separate $1.4bn judgment against him in Connecticut.
The Texas third court of appeals has unanimously ruled to significantly cut the damages owed by Alex Jones, founder of the rightwing media platform Infowars, over his false claims that the 2012 Sandy Hook elementary school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, never happened. The previously set $50m judgment has now been reduced to $1.5m.
Jones and his company, Free Speech Systems, had been found liable in court for the harm caused by his repeated assertions that the mass shooting, in which children and educators were killed, was a hoax. Those claims subsequently fueled a wave of harassment directed at the families of the victims.
The court's decision does not touch a separate, far larger $1.4bn judgment previously issued against Jones in Connecticut. Even so, the Texas ruling represents a notable legal win for Jones amid his ongoing legal battles.
The appeals court based its decision on a Texas state cap limiting damages to $750,000. Sandy Hook parents Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, who brought the case, were found by the court not to have presented sufficient evidence that the harassment stirred up by Jones's hoax claims reached a level severe enough to justify exceeding that statutory cap.
The litigation against Jones continues across multiple courts, with further developments expected.
