US Politics

Marion McKeone: $1bn damages award and still Alex Jones taunts Sandy Hook families

The shock jock who claimed the Sandy Hook massacre was a hoax, questions whether the families will ever see any of the cash awarded by a Connecticut court. But even if he doesn’t end up paying, his InfoWars social media outlets where he spreads his lies are likely to be hobbled by the award

Alex Jones, the InfoWars founder, at Waterbury Superior Court in Connecticut where a jury awarded $964.4 million in compensatory damages against him to be divided among 15 plaintiffs. The award was made in a defamation case connected to Jones’ claims that the Sandy Hook mass shooting in 2012, in which 26 people died, was a hoax. Picture: Getty

On March 25, 2019, Dr Jeremy Richman was found dead at his office in Newton, Connecticut. His death by hanging was ruled a suicide.

Richman, a neuroscientist, and his wife Hensel, a microbiologist who worked on the research and development of cancer drugs for children, had set up the Arielle Foundation in memory of their daughter.

Six years earlier, on December 14, 2012, six-year-old Arielle Richman was one of 20 children killed during a mass ...