The far-right website InfoWars on Sunday filed a petition for voluntary protection against Chapter 11 insolvency in the U.S. Insolvency Court for the Southern District of Texas in the face of numerous defamation cases.
The insolvency proceedings under Chapter 11 suspend all civil cases and allow companies to draw up recovery plans while remaining operational.
Alex Jones, founder of InfoWars, has been found responsible for damages in three lawsuits filed last year after he falsely claimed that the Sandy Hook school massacre in 2012 was a fraud.
Jones claims that the shooting, in which 20 children and six school employees were shot dead at a school in Newtown, Connecticut, was fabricated by proponents of gun control and the media.
In late March, Sandy Hook’s family rejected Jones’ offer of a defamation lawsuit and reopened the case. Jones offered to pay $ 120,000 to each of the 13 plaintiffs to settle the case.
Each of the plaintiffs rejected the proposal for an agreement in court documents, saying: “The so-called offer is a transparent and desperate attempt by Alex Jones to escape public account under oath with his fraudulent, profit-oriented campaign against the plaintiffs and a memory of their loved ones lost in Sandy Hook. “
According to court documents on Sunday, InfoWars listed its estimated assets in the range of $ 0- $ 50,000 and estimated liabilities in the range of $ 1 million to $ 10 million.
Jones, a vocal supporter of former US President Donald Trump, was previously summoned by a House of Representatives committee investigating the January 2021 attack on the US Capitol by Trump supporters.
(Report by Rahna Dhanrajani, Akriti Sharma in Bengaluru and Kanishka Singh in Washington; edited by Kirsten Donovan and Hugh Lawson)
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