Law&Crime Sidebar - Top 5 Moments of Alex Jones' Sandy Hook Defamation Trial Week One

Episode Date: September 17, 2022

The Law&Crime Network's Jesse Weber provides a recap of week one of Alex Jones' Sandy Hook defamation trial in Connecticut.LAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergVideo Editing - Michael Deininger Guest Booking - Alyssa FisherSocial Media Management - Kiera BronsonSUBSCRIBE TO OUR OTHER PODCASTS:Court JunkieObjectionsThey Walk Among AmericaCoptales and CocktailsThe Disturbing TruthSpeaking FreelyLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

We recap the top five moments from... Wonderly Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wonderly Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Rousseau must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand view's shadows.

Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Week one in Alex Jones's Connecticut trial. What a first week it has been in Alex Jones. Jones's trial out in Connecticut. The conspiracy theorist and Info Wars host has been sued by a former FBI agent and family members of those killed in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting for his comments over the years that Sandy Hook was a hoax, that it was staged, that these were crisis actors. They sued him for defamation, intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress, invasion of privacy, unfair trade practices. And they've already won this case. That's right. Because the court

a default judgment against Alex Jones because he basically refused to comply with discovery obligations during the course of this litigation. And when that happens, and you don't comply with court orders or discovery obligations, you automatically lose. So this case is all about how much he owes in damages. It's the same kind of thing we saw in Jones's Texas trial. Default judgment, it was only about the damages here. And that's what this is about. A jury of six will determine how much he has to pay out to the plaintiffs. Now, what the plaintiffs, are saying here, is that Jones knew the story was false, that these views and engagement were going up from his supporters, that he kept pushing the story, he kept profiting off of it, and that

these plaintiffs were targeted, they were harassed, they were threatened by Jones supporters, on top of all of the emotional pain of being told that this was fake. So Jones is already in this kind of losing position, and I should tell you, he hasn't shown up in court this week, but we do think he is going to eventually show up because we believe he's going to be taking the stand. So we thought, let's recap the top five moments from week one. And I think the best place to start is what happened right at the beginning. Before a jury even came in, before opening statements, right before all of this, Jones took a huge loss. You see, according to the plaintiffs and the judge ended up agreeing, Judge Barbara Bellis,

Jones refused to hand over a key piece of evidence to the other side, this Google analytics information about web traffic on Infoars. And that was a big problem. And as you're about to see, the court, the judge, was not too happy. The defendants, Texas attorneys were all well aware of the existence of the Google Analytics report half a year ago. But in this case, the defendants filed pleadings with the court representing that Mr. Roddy had no Google Analytics documents, didn't know what the corporate representative was referring to. and perhaps the most egregious representation in the filings states that the defendant contends and has always contended that neither he nor the various entities with which he is affiliated

has such data and that there was nothing more that could be done that defendants knew of the existence of the Google analytic documents at a time these representations were made to the court by their counsel so I'll make the following observation this stunningly cavalier attitude with respect to their discovery obligations is what led to the default in the first place the defendants have consistently engaged in dilatory and obstructive discovery practices from the inception of these cases right through to the trial and finally I will note there is there is no notice in this file to this minute of any supplemental compliance producing the Google

analytic documents, which is required by the practice book, but was also required by my clear court order of September 30, 2021, which apparently was not followed here. So the motion is denied for these reasons, and the court hereby sanctions the defendants by precluding them from presenting evidence or argument that they did not profit from the Sandy Hook coverage. All right. And now you're, is this the, Judge, I think you granted the motion. You said you denied it. I'm sorry. The motion's granted. Thank you, Your Honor. I can't say that's a huge surprise, considering the guy who lost the case for not complying with discovery obligations, just got sanctioned for not complying with discovery obligations. And this punishment is really bad for Alex

Jones because it would have been very helpful for him to argue that he didn't profit off of Sandy Hook coverage, but now he can't say that. But the judge's irritation with the defense didn't really end there because the defense is limited in what they can argue, particularly since Jones lost the liability portion of the case, as I mentioned. So as you'll see, Norm Patis, who's Jones attorney, he was getting a bit colorful in his arguments and the judge put an end to it. Our contention, to be clear, is that these damage claims here are exaggerated because of the idiosyncratic motives of the plaintiffs, transforming their griefs into political weapons.

You'll have to decide whether that's true. But here's what you learned in 2016. Alex Jones became a household name again when a presidential candidate used him to berate her opponent and talked about Sandy Hook, Hillary Clinton. She never got sued. Objection, Your Honor. Can we stop this, please? Sustained. Move on, Attorney Pattis, please.

How many times did you notice how many times I objected to you letting them tell their story? Attorney Pattis, that is improper, and either finish your opening or be seated. In 2017, Matt Alex was interviewed by Megan Kelly on NBC. He worried it'd be a hit piece. He sat for the interview. It was a hit piece. Megan Kelly didn't get sued. Alex got sued.

Objection. Your honor. Attorney Pattis, one more time, and I will ask me to be seated. People wrote these folks hate me. You'll read. People stalk them. People threaten them. People appeared at some of their home.

Each slight, some of them will tell you, was as though a scat had been torn from a wound that will never really heal. They blame Alex for all of it, all of them. This issue was largely dead until Hillary Clinton made a campaign of issue of it in 2016, blaming Jones for Sandy Hook and Associated. Attorney Pals, no, you may not, because I already ruled on the Clinton issue and were moved on from that, so now you've talked about Megan Kelly, so let's address Megan Kelly. It's a similar issue, Dickon.

Well, then stick with the Megan Kelly, and I don't want to hear Hillary Clinton again. You've told me I can't ask about Megan Kelly. I'm not going to. Okay, I understand. Of course you're not. One minute. So I don't, so I'm not going to give it. Well, if you did the Hillary Clinton, now we did the Meg and Kelly. Should we address what's coming next?

No. Well, I think it might make sense. Judge, I'm not, I'm not responsible for giving my adversaries a preview of what's to come anymore than apparently they were responsible for telling me what witnesses they were going to call today. I understand your ruling. This has been a contentious trial. I am not going to get crosshairs with you on the first day or second or 15th day of trial. I understand your ruling.

I will move on. I would just say let's move on carefully. Yikes. Yeah. Again, Pattis's argument can't be that this is a political hit job. He can't say that Jones is innocent. He can't say that Jones did nothing wrong. He can't make excuses for what Jones did.

That would have all been on the first part of the. trial, as I said, Jones lost. So really the only argument that Pattis can make here is that maybe the damages aren't warranted, like a large damages award isn't warranted because maybe the plaintiffs didn't suffer as much as they claim. That's an argument. But moving on, another significant moment was when one of the plaintiffs took the stand. Former FBI agent William Aldenberg was a first responder that day of the Sandy Hook massacre, and he really brought it back to what this case is about, the horror of that day, and what the response was from Jones supporters saying this was fake.

Was what you saw in that school fake? No, no. No, sir. Was it synthetic? No, sir. See any actors that day, Bill? No. There's children real?

It's awful. It's awful. Tell the jury. the types of reports that you received and that you, as the FBI, managing the FBI's response, responded to. Death threats. People calling all kinds of numbers in Newtown saying that, this is Adam Lanza. I'm going to come and kill you all. Telling people their children aren't dead, that they're actors. That's what I'm referring to all the time.

The families aren't real. The children weren't real. Death threats and serious stuff from seriously disturbed people. And this went on for 18 months. Oh, it went on much longer than 18 months. It only went on 18 months for that particular victim specialist because she ended up transferring. it continued on continued it will

it's going to continue after today like you know when I Jack Shan moved to strike speculative non-responseous it's not speculative objection I am going to sustain the objection

and strike that answer it continued throughout the entire time your chief division counsel it's been going on for 10 years and you can understand why he was so upset and people want to say this didn't happen

and then they want to get rich off of it? That's the worst probably. Like, you know what? You can say whatever you want about me. I don't care. Just say whatever you want. I'm frigging a big boy. I can take it.

Then they want to make profits. They want to get millions and millions of dollars. They want to destroy people's lives. Their children got slaughtered. I saw it myself. Now, from there, another notable witness this week was Britney Paz. She is the corporate representative for Free Speech Systems LLC, basically InfoWars. And this is not somebody who worked for the company for 20 years.

No, she was hired by Jones's defense. She was paid around $30,000 to review the business records, the financial documents, interview employees, so that she could testify on behalf of the company. And it's interesting that she was chosen to do this as opposed to, you know, Alex Jones or another member of his company. and, in fact, her time on the stand was pretty contentious and pretty tense as she was grilled by plaintiff's attorney Chris Maddie about the inner workings of the company and why exactly she was appointed as the representative. Now, let's pull up kings of their domains and just pull up the, yeah, okay, that's okay.

Here he is saying in terms of web popularity, infowars.com and prisonplanet.com are on top. of their class, right? That's what it says, yes. And this is 2013, correct? I think that's the date that was on the document, yes. Okay, and it gives the number of visitors to the websites per month, the number of unique visitors per month, the number of 30 million page views per month, right?

Yes, that's what it says. Okay. Ms. Paz, isn't this free speech systems using Google Analytics? Google Analytics? I don't know how they got those numbers. Well, we've seen the Google Analytics where these numbers are presented, correct? We've seen Google Analytics numbers, yes. Where else would they have gotten?

I don't know. I don't know where they... But you know that they didn't use them. That's what you told the judge. I told the court what information was relayed to me that they did not regularly use the Google Analytics in terms of their marketing. What you told the judge was, because the judge asked you, is that a yes or no, in response to the question, does free speech systems use Google Analytics? She said, is that a yes or no?

And you said, that's a no, right? Right. And the reason you think it's a no is because that's what InfoWars and Alex Jones told you, correct? I don't believe Alex told me that, but I think I said Blake Roddy told me that. And it's not true, is it? I can only convey to what I've discussed with the employees and what I've reviewed.

So that's based on my review. Because InfoWars doesn't want this jury to know just how closely it was tracking its audience growth as Alex Jones was saying that Sandy Hook was a lie, right? I don't think that's accurate. Let's go down to the next page here. You don't think that's accurate because somebody told you that? Do I think I want the jury not to know about the goddess and shows?

Not you, not you. Alex Jones. Whoever claimed to you, they don't use Google Analytics, wanted you to say that to this jury. Objection, just speculating. Contents of another mind. Do I think that Mr. Roddy didn't want me to know that free speech uses Google Analytics? Well, he definitely didn't want you to know that.

That's why he told you that they don't use it, right? I don't think that was the reason why he told me that. No. Okay. Whatever the case is, when Mr. Roddy told you that they don't use Google Analytics, he knew that that's what you were going to come and tell this jury, right? Objection, Judge. Sustained. All right. And throughout her testimony, the plaintiffs were able to demonstrate how much InfoWars was promoting the Sandy Hook coverage, how they saw this increased online engagement. They were making money. And how Jones, you know, really engaged in this kind of systematic campaign of misinformation

for years for profit. But I will leave you with this. We know that Jones is going to testify. We know this. And we even did a sidebar the other day about Jones literally going on Stephen Crowder, Crowder, conservative commentator, to talk about these trials, as this is trial is really going on. He's talking about it.

So just listen to what Brittany Paz was asked about regarding InfoWords this week. You been watching the show this week? Have I been watching the show? No, I don't generally watch. show okay so generally though what mr. Jones does is he's trying to attract audience so that you can send them to the store right that's the business model we've been talking about yes the way he's been attracting audience this week while we all have been here is by talking about this trial

correct action facts not in evidence she doesn't know sustained okay well let me show council exhibit 479. May I approach you honor? You may. You see that? I do. Do you see Mr. Jones logo for band dot video in the corner? I do. Do you see Bill Aldenberg depicted in that picture? I do. Do you see letter of placed in the lower left-hand corner of the screen that says Alex Jones Kangaroo Court watch day one I see that yes I'm sorry your arm I'd offer it it's not self-authenticating objections miss pause you recognize this to in fact be a

screen grab of footage that mr. Jones played earlier this week correct she She hadn't seen it, Judge. I hadn't, I've never seen this, and I haven't seen the show, and I haven't reviewed it, so I can't say what this is. Okay. Mr. Jones and pre-speech systems, as far as you know, is the only company that controls the band. Dot video platform, correct? As far as I'm aware. And you see that logo right on there?

In the upper right-hand corner? Yes, ma'am. I see it. Okay. I'd offer it, Your Honor. Objection, not self-authenticating. Sustained. Move to strike the representations made about what happened.

You just can't make this stuff up. And thanks, everybody, for joining us here on Sidebar. Please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcast. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.