The Infowars conspiracy broadcaster Alex Jones must pay the families of eight Sandy Hook shooting victims an additional $473 million in punitive damages for defaming them, a judge in Connecticut ruled on Thursday, bringing the total damages to nearly $1.5 billion.
Last month, a jury in Waterbury, Conn., awarded the families and an F.B.I. agent implicated in Mr. Jones’s false claims $965 million in compensatory damages. The jury also awarded the families punitive damages in the form of lawyers’ fees, to be calculated by the judge. The $473 million awarded on Thursday by Judge Barbara N. Bellis of Connecticut Superior Court represents those damages.
