Trial Court’s Post-Verdict Error Triggers Major Reduction in Damages for Alex Jones

A Texas appellate court Friday slashed more than $43 million in exemplary damages awarded against Alex Jones, holding that the trial judge erred by letting the parents of a student murdered in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting to amend their petition post-verdict in order to avoid the state’s cap on exemplary damages. 

A three-justice panel of the Third Court of Appeals in Austin issued the 47-page opinion in an appeal lodged by Alex Jones and his company, Free Speech Systems, in the litigation brought by Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis. Heslin and Lewis sued Jones for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress based on repeated claims he aired to his audience that the December 2012 mass shooting at the school, that killed 20 children and six adults, was a hoax and that the grieving parents were actors.