InfoWars host and notorious fringe Right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones has been attempting to weasel his way out of the literal millions and millions of dollars he owes as a result of the multiple lawsuits he lost to the families of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims due to his repeated lies and defamation of the victims and families on his podcast show. But they’re onto him now, and they’re looking to square up.
According to new reporting from Reuters, the families of the Sandy Hook shooting victims have put together a strong case and are now looking to effectively reverse suspicious payments Alex Jones made to his wife and other members of his family in what appeared to be a shady attempt to divert funds and assets out of his name to avoid making good on the payments he was ordered to make to the families. If successful, this payment reversal would begin to satisfy the staggering $1.5 billion in judgments the Sandy Hook families won against the Right-wing conspiracy theorist and talk show host, who has since claimed bankruptcy, over his lies about the 2012 elementary school massacre.
David Zensky, a lawyer for the families, participated in a bankruptcy court hearing in Houston on Friday, where he told the court that Alex Jones has consistently engaged in “financial gymnastics” in a concerted effort to hide his money and assets for the sole purpose of avoiding paying the judgments ruled against him in favor of the families. Jones has done so by spreading his money out amongst friends, family members, and shell companies to get it out of his name as he continues to claim that he’s broke and bankrupt, and therefore unable to pony up the money.
Zensky noted that the Sandy Hook families have a “very strong case” to put an end to Jones’ bullshit schemes and begin to reverse the shady payment distributions among Jones’ friends and family, including a $1 million payment Alex made to his wife.
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U.S. bankruptcy law dictates that debtors or their creditors or allowed to backtrack and essentially unwind any transfers or payments that were made before the bankruptcy was filed, that were made in an attempt to disperse funds out of an individual’s name to avoid paying off debts they owe.
All in all, the Sandy Hook families and their legal teams have launched investigations into a staggering $62 million in suspicious transfers Alex Jones has made out of his company, Free Speech Systems (FSS), before ultimately filing for bankruptcy. The families further accuse the InfoWars host of specifically cranking up the amount of funds and assets he was shifting around as the defamation cases neared trial with the likelihood that he would lose.
Vickie Driver, an attorney for Jones, said the talk show host isn’t opposed to the reversal of the payments, if the families can successfully prove that they were made improperly, with the intention of skirting the judgment ruling. However, Jones has asserted his preference for an independent expert to conduct that analysis of his finances.
“You can imagine that if someone was to sue their wife over transfers, that’s a little hard in the home,” Driver stated.
The defamation cases came as a result of Jones using his InfoWars show and his position as a “famous” person in the Right-wing world to repeatedly and publicly claim that the 2012 shooting that killed 20 innocent children and 6 school employees was a hoax, a staged government plot to take guns away from American citizens and defile their 2nd Amendment rights. Jones has since recanted these claims.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Christopher Lopez, who is currently overseeing Jones’ bankruptcy case, has encouraged Jones and the families to attempt one more time to mediate the situation and reach a settlement outside of a trial.
“It’s time for everyone to put their cards on the table,” Judge Lopez stated in a ruling that set a mediation deadline of July 21st.
The Sandy Hook families are not only attempting to reverse Jones’ suspicious payments and transfers but also seek to prevent Jones from invoking his shady bankruptcy to side-skirt the billion-dollar judgments.
Read the full report from Reuters here.
Featured image via screen capture
