US conspiracy theorist faces nearly USD 1bn in damages for school shooting case

Washington [US], October 13 : A US court has asked Infowars founder and "conspiracy theorist" Alex Jones to pay families of Sandy Hook shooting victims and a first responder nearly USD 1 billion, media reports said.
A jury in the state of Connecticut decided that Alex should pay eight families of Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims and one police official USD 965 million in compensatory damages, CNN reported.
Although the decision was announced on Wednesday, the report said the judge in the case has yet to consider punitive damages.
Christopher Mattei, an attorney for the families of Sandy Hook victims, lauded the court verdict.
"For over a month in this courthouse, this jury bore witness to Alex Jones' 10-year attack on the families standing behind me. An attack that made him very rich, an attack that exploited the fears and resentments of his audience, an attack that targeted these families with the lie that they were frauds," Mattei was quoted as saying by CNN.
In December 2012, a 20-year-old man shot and killed 26 people, in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting that occurred, in Newtown, Connecticut.
Most of the victims in the incident were children, which was considered one of the deadliest mass shootings in a school.
The shooting prompted renewed debate about gun control in the country, including gun legislation on banning the sale and manufacture of certain types of semi-automatic firearms.
Later, radio host Alex Jones said that the Sandy Hook shooting was "completely fake" and a "giant hoax" perpetrated by opponents of gun rights.
Subsequently, he was sued for defamation by three parents whose children were killed in the shooting.