Sandy Hook victims present evidence Alex Jones profited from claims that the school shooting was a hoax

The Sandy Hook families trying to collect millions from Internet conspiracy theorist Alex Jones presented evidence in their defamation suit Wednesday that he knew from analysis of his website traffic that both his audience and sales spiked when he broadcast what became years of diatribes dismissing the Newtown school massacre as a hoax.

The claim that Jones intentionally converted one of the country’s most tragic mass murders into a profit center is an element of the families’ suit. They are seeking compensation for years of harassment by members of Jones’ global audience who became convinced by his assertions that the murdered children and their parents were actors in a hoax created to win support for gun control.

One of the lawyers for the family, Christopher Mattei, spent hours Wednesday trying to draw admissions from a Jones’ corporate representative that Jones tracked audience and sales with website analytic tools and that his years of Sandy Hook denials were part of a cynical plan to boost profits.

But many of Mattei’s questions went unanswered by the representative, Connecticut lawyer Brittany Paz, who conceded she was testifying blindly on some issues because Jones had not given her complete access to the records of his wholly-owned company, Free Speech Systems, to prepare to testify.

Among other things, Paz said that when she was preparing to act as corporate representative in a suit that turned on internet traffic, she was not provided by Jones or his company with figures on the volume of visits to their social media sites.

Asked whether it is reasonable to believe that Jones, reported to have earned $50 million in annual revenue in recent years from sales, had personally profited from his family of websites by as much as $500 million over the last decade, Paz said, “I can’t talk about his personal finances. I’m here to talk about Free Speech.”

“He has become very, very rich, hasn’t he?” Mattei asked.

“I know he has made some millions of dollars,” Paz said.

“Has he made, personally, $100 million?” Mattei asked.

“I don’t know what the number is,” Paz said.

A question that dominated the questioning was to what extent Jones used a website analytics program offered by Google to monitor traffic to his family of conspiracy-oriented websites and resulting sales. Paz said the websites were designed to drive customers to Jones’ line of nutritional supplements, survivalist gear and clothing.

She said Jones and those who reported to him had access to the program but did not “actively use” it. Mattei then produced corporate records that suggest Free Speech Systems used the programs to track web traffic over several years beginning around Dec. 14, 2012, the date of the school shooting that killed 20 first graders and six educators.

Jones was on the air for his radio show within hours of the shooting, questioning whether it was real. Within two years, she acknowledged, notorious Sandy Hook denier, Wolfgang Halbig, was a repeated guest on Jones’ show.

The records Mattei presented to jurors show that Jones’ most important website, Infowars.com, got 24.9 million site visits in December 2012, when the shootings took place. The number jumped to 35.7 million the following month. Other records show that visits to Jones’ content on social media sites grew from 2.2 billion in 2014 to 4.2 billion in 2016.

Mattei also produced records showing that Jones and his company used web page analytics to pitch their sites to advertisers. In 2014, they marketed Infowars as “The House that Truth Built” and said it was within the country’s top 350 websites in terms of traffic.

Paz testified that Jones closely controlled his business and would have been familiar with trends. When Mattei asked whether traffic increases between 2014 and 2016 could be considered “exponential,” she answered “Using Mr. Jones’ words, yes.”

Describing the corporate structure of Free Speech Systems, Paz testified, “The only structure there is that Alex is on the top.” She also said Jones’ father testified earlier in a deposition that, “Free Speech Systems is a single talent business - that talent being Alex.”

Paz said Jones hired her in January for $37,000 to be his corporate representative and testify for Free Speech Systems in suits by Sandy Hook victims in Texas and Connecticut. She said she was notified of her hiring by Jones’ Connecticut lawyer, Norman A. Pattis, for whom she formerly worked.

At the time, she said she knew nothing about Jones or his business. She said she had never visited any of Jones’ websites, or watched any of his videos, but was told she had two weeks to prepare before testifying for the first time in Texas.

“As I sit here today, I am the corporation Free Speech systems,” Paz said.

Paz acknowledged under Mattei’s questions that Jones’ claims that Sandy Hook was staged are false and that she is aware that members of his audience harassed relatives of Sandy Hook victims, calling them, among other things , crisis actors. She is scheduled to continue testifying Thursday.

The trial before Superior Court Judge Barbara Bellis is for the jury to determine what compensation Jones owes those suing him — 14 relatives of 9 victims and an FBI agent who was among the first responders. The suit accuses Jones of defamation, infliction of emotional distress and violation of the state’s unfair trade practices law, a law that places no ceiling on potential damages.

In an unusual default ruling last year, Bellis settled the suit in favor of the victims, saying Jones forfeited his right to defend himself from liability by violating her orders and courtroom procedure by failing to participate in the joint disclosure of records and other pretrial proceedings.