Jury Awards Sandy Hook Parents $4M In Alex Jones Defamation Trial

NEWTOWN, CT — The jury in the trial to determine how much in damages radio host Alex Jones should pay Sandy Hook parents Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis has made its decision, awarding the pair $4.1 million.

The jurors had been told that Jones and his company, Free Speech Systems, inflicted intentional emotional distress on Heslin and Lewis by repeatedly portraying the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting as a hoax.

Attorneys for the parents of Jesse Lewis told jurors the radio host should pay $150 million in damages. Jones' legal team had tried to make the case their opposition failed to prove the parents were actually and directly harmed by Jones' words.

Jesse was among the 20 children and six staff at Sandy Hook Elementary School who were killed in 2012 by a 20-year-old gunman. Jones told listeners to his InfoWars show the deaths were a "false flag" being promoted by gun control fanatics.

Both parents have experienced post-traumatic stress disorder and anxiety because of repeated threats from Jones' followers, according to a therapist who testified Monday. The following day both parents were taken into protective isolation following unspecified incidents.

Jones fell on his sword Wednesday, telling the Austin, TX, courtroom that he definitely thinks the attack happened.

"Especially since I've met the parents. It's 100% real," Jones said.

The two-week-long trial also took a quirky turn Wednesday when it was revealed the radio host's attorney Andino Reynal had accidentally sent a large volume of his client's private texts and emails to the opposing legal team. Reynal filed a protective order seeking to bar his opposition from using the data against his client, and asked the judge for a mistrial. He didn't get one.

Those communications included "intimate messages with Roger Stone" a colleague of former President Donald Trump. Jones was subpoeaned by the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection alongside Jones in November 2021, the Associated Press reported last year.