A Connecticut judge imposed sanctions on Alex Jones for his “egregious” refusal to turn over evidence to Sandy Hook families suing him for defamation.
Judge Barbara Bellis sanctioned the right-wing conspiracy theorist Tuesday morning at the start of his second defamation trial after his legal team failed to turn over Google Analytics to the plaintiffs, which she said had been a troubling pattern from previous cases, reported Law & Crime.
"This stunningly cavalier attitude with respect to their discovery obligations is what led to the default in the first place,” Bellis said. “The defendants have consistently engaged in dilatory and obstructionist discovery practices, from the inception of these cases right through to the trial.”
The judge forbade Jones' defense team from presenting evidence or arguments in this trial that the broadcaster and his entities did not profit from their coverage of the Sandy Hook school massacre, saying they had refused to comply with her clear order to turn over that data to the plaintiffs as part of the discovery process.
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"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,” Bellis said. “This defendant knew of the existence of the Google Analytics documents at the time these representations were made to the court by their counsel.”
Jones has been punished with default judgments in three separate cases for refusing to turn over discovery information to Sandy Hook families, meaning he lost all three lawsuits before the trials began, leaving only the monetary damages to be decided.