The families of Sandy Hook school shooting victims voted overwhelmingly in favor of a plan to wrap up Alex Jones’ bankruptcy proceedings by liquidating the right wing talk show host’s assets.

  • Jaysyn@kbin.social
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    Jones’ general unsecured creditors—comprised mostly of Sandy Hook families holding about $1.5 billion in defamation judgments against the famed conspiracy theorist—voted 100% in favor of a Chapter 11 plan that would methodically liquidate and redistribute his property and cash, while preserving potential legal actions against parties affiliated with Jones and his Infowars program.

    I hope he dies penniless under a bridge somewhere, like the troll he is.

    • Son_of_dad@lemmy.world
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      Once you reach a certain level of wealthy, you literally cannot die poor. Sadly this isn’t the movie trading places. Billionaires don’t go fully broke, they’re always allowed to keep a certain level of wealth forever after

      • vortic@lemmy.world
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        I agree with you. Just a note, though; Alex isn’t a billionaire. Even the plaintiff’s lawyers estimated his wealth at only “as much as $270M”. It still makes me sad to realize how many people he grifted, defamed, and otherwise harmed to make that much money…

      • KneeTitts@lemmy.world
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        Well ya super rich people designed the entire legal system in the US specifically to protect themselves from ever have to face any real consequences for their crimes. You dont have to look much further than Donald J Trump to see how thats working.

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          We never brought them to the guillotines in the US.

          So they think they can do whatever they want.

          Europe still remembers, but they are slowly forgetting too.

          Might be time for another culling.

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        Jones definitely isn’t a billionaire. He owns a glorified YouTube Channel that sells supplements and brain pills. Hopefully he is toast.

        • ChunkMcHorkle@lemmy.world
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          Funny thing is that his base really doesn’t like losers.** Once the hammer falls, I fully expect to see his popularity wane, no matter how much he is bolstered by right-wing propaganda in other places.

          ** Note that Trump himself is still in the “fighting injustice” stage, which his base loves. Once he exits that phase and officially becomes a Loser – if his many lawsuits catch up with him financially like Jones’ are, for example, or if he doesn’t succeed at the next coup attempt – they will desert him too. This is because Trump’s magic rests entirely upon making people who feel powerless and downtrodden by society feel like winners, based on always placing them in an adversarial position against Others, like immigrants, people of color, non-cis/het, etc. In other words, his power over them is 100% emotive, and it’s what all the foreign-funded propaganda is built around. So right now as Trump “fights injustice” (cough) they all get a vicarious thrill because he’s sticking it to The Man and Telling It Like It Is and rebranding right as wrong and all that absolute horseshit. But if/when Trump too enters the Obvious Loser phase, they will desert him quietly and quickly, to the point that in a couple of years it will be impossible to find anyone who admits to ever having been taken in by him.

          • villainy@lemmy.world
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            Funny thing is that his base really doesn’t like losers.

            Yeah but they would never blindly follow a loser. All these court cases and elections are just frauds and everyone knows that if you’ve been frauded you didn’t really lose! 100% win rate confirmed, logical consistency achieved.

      • Perfide
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        Jones isn’t even remotely a billionaire

      • thefartographer@lemm.ee
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        Yup, usually an African prince trying to hide his wealth ends up giving a sack of cash to homeless, temporarily embarrassed billionaires while he’s on a date with a business mogul’s knockoff’s daughter.

    • jballs@sh.itjust.works
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      The vote indicates the creditors’ preference over a competing plan submitted by Jones that would allow him to reorganize by preserving parts of his media empire and paying the group at least $5.5 million a year over 10 years.

      Lmao this part cracks me up the most. He was like “how about instead of selling all my stuff, I give you pennies on the dollar of what I owe you for a few years and we call it good?”

      • frunch@lemmy.world
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        He’s been dealing with some of the dumbest fucks on the planet (his viewers/listeners) for so long he thinks ridiculous shit like that works on everyone

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        Would you like $100 million now or $55 million later?

        He could have at least tripled the offer in order to get a real shot. I expect they’re invested in his fall, however.

    • WhyYesZoidberg@lemmy.world
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      The only upside with Alex Jones is the spawn of the “Knowledge Fight” podcast.

      I RENOUNCE JESUS CHRIST -Alex Jones

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    Sandy Hook families holding about $1.5 billion in defamation judgments […] a competing plan submitted by Jones that would allow him to reorganize by preserving parts of his media empire and paying the group at least $5.5 million a year over 10 years

    Literally pennies on the dollar.

    His house in Austin, that he bought for a couple million dollars, he sold to his wife in 2022 for the grand total of ten dollars. They’re going to claw that back from him for trying to hide it. And then they’re going to force him to sell it because Texas bankruptcy law only keeps your house in a city or town safe from bankruptcy seizure if it’s one acre or less. And the lot his house is on is 1.089 acres - such a shame!

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      Sandy Hook families holding about $1.5 billion in defamation judgments […] a competing plan submitted by Jones that would allow him to reorganize by preserving parts of his media empire and paying the group at least $5.5 million a year over 10 years

      What’s the difference between 1.5 billion and 5.5 million? About 1.5 billion.

    • TurtleJoe@lemmy.world
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      Sandy Hook families holding about $1.5 billion in defamation judgments […] a competing plan submitted by Jones that would allow him to reorganize by preserving parts of his media empire and paying the group at least $5.5 million a year over 10 years

      Why did you omit the part where they didn’t accept that plan? Those ellipses did some heavy lifting.

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        It really is the best part, because he’s trying to weasel out of it saying “if you want money I’ve got to keep the machine running to make more” but the families holding him accountable are setting his everything on fire telling him it was never about the money, and that’s awesome. He was hoping greed would save his ass but here he is in the hands of people who want real justice - the dismantling of the very machine he used to do harm.

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          Assuming no one else comes in and finances a new platform for him. I’d be surprised if it doesn’t happen.

        • butterflyattack@lemmy.world
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          I wonder if his assets include infowars? Would be another nail in coffin of his hopes if the families gave it to the knowledge fight guys. Funny as fuck, too.

    • nothing@lemm.ee
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      Also there may be state specific differences, but the transfer of his assets to his wife only is called a “fraudulent conveyance” and is still able to be obtained to the debtors. Also it was a dick move and requires more lawyers.

  • OhStopYellingAtMe@lemmy.world
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    I don’t know what’s funnier; Alex Jones’s estate being liquidated to pay back the families of his victims, or Mike Lindell being forced to pay the $5 million “prize” he offered to disprove his election fraud lies, and then was sued because he refused to pay it after he was easily disproven.

    God damn it’s a good week for honesty.

  • Gazumi@lemmy.world
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    Bbbbbbb but, what about his freedom of speech!!! I hope that he finds complete misery and hopelessness after the things he’s done to those families.

    • eltrain123@lemmy.world
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      He is free to say whatever he wants and the government can’t stop him.

      He is also accountable to his victims if his actions cause them financial harm.

      Freedom of speech remains intact.

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          Yep…need to highlight the differences between saying “we need to be aware that this could be a false flag operation by Democrats to condition American citizens to accept oppressive gun control” and “(specific) people took money from George Soros to fake having a child and fake having them die in a fake school shooting because they hate America and want to make everyone slaves. We used to kill people like that, people who did what (specific person) did” over and over on nationally accessible broadcasts. Roughly paraphrased AJ’s stance there, but you get the point.

    • Admiral Patrick@dubvee.org
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      Every time someone asks me the difference between free speech and freeze-peach, I just point to this asshole.

        • rmuk@feddit.uk
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          No, freeze peach. You still need to pay for them. But the price of the right to freeze peach is microwave peach.

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            And im proud to be an American where the peaches are free and I won’t forget the trees that died and gave that right to me

    • CeeBee@lemmy.world
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      after the things he’s done to those families.

      It’s been a while since I read up on it, what things are you referring to?

      Edit: hey, sorry for not being American and hearing about this stuff nonstop like Americans do. I’m truly sorry for asking a genuine question.

      • NABDad@lemmy.world
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        From https://www.texastribune.org/2022/10/12/alex-jones-sandy-hook-shooting/ (the first hit in my Google results):

        Within hours of the shooting, Jones was telling his audience that it was staged as a pretext for confiscating guns. Within days, he began to suggest that grieving parents were actors. In the years that followed, he repeatedly said the massacre was faked.

        The families testified during the trial that the lies spread by Jones led to harassment and threats by conspiracy theorists who have accused them of faking their own children’s deaths. They described feeling unsafe in their own homes and hypervigilant in public. Some of the families moved away from Newtown.

      • octopus_ink@lemmy.ml
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        If you have ever read up on it, I don’t think it’s changed much since the last time you did.

        • CeeBee@lemmy.world
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          Ok, I read up on it after I posted my comment. Truth is I have a porous memory (yes that’s a thing) and forgot specifics on topics from things like the news. I’m not American so that kind of news isn’t front and center all the time like it is there.

          As soon as I read it it clicked though. For whatever reason, I thought there was something else that happened that I didn’t know about.

  • reagansrottencorpse@lemmy.world
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    We should do this more. Liquidate bad wealthy people’s assets and distribute it to those they have harmed.

    Granted that hasn’t happened here yet, but I hope it does.

    • Agent641@lemmy.world
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      Dissolve the board of directors.

      Sandy hook parents can choose what kind of acid to use.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    This is like the best news day in ages.

    (Sorry, I’m out of Rikers and need a refill. Two Rikers in an hour is just too many and I already used up the two I had.)

    • orclev@lemmy.world
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      We can only hope. If we’re really good this year maybe Santa will bring us the same thing for another one of these disgusting wastes of oxygen like Tucker Carlson or MTG.

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    This dude has got to be hiding gold somewhere, now they just need to find out where.

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        Oof… Lemme tell yeh the people who believe in gold are very dedicated. The idea of a currency collapse where gold will retain it’s value is sort of the hoarding food and toilet paper for an apocalypse move… But gold is just as subject to becoming very close to useless as anything else in situations of extreme scarcity. There are lots of tales of wartime famine where people wheel out and lose what would normally be considered valuable to trade for practically nothing. Other than that the market value of gold can dip just like anything else but people love the stuff by default it seems.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          The value of gold can dip if someone digs the right hole in the right place. That alone is a reason not to trust it. I do like the preppers who think gold will be worth more than, say, chickens if society collapses.

      • thefartographer@lemm.ee
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        Lol, Alex Jones trying to hold court in front of Rogan and Musk, “Gold? You actually trust that shit? Gold is the quickest way to lose money cuz anyone can sell anything for any amount and call it gold. I should know, I do it all the time!”

    • ZeroCool@slrpnk.net
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      Alex Jones is a raging alcoholic. Nobody’s interested in those vodka marinaded organs. You can pick a random episode of the Knowledge Fight podcast and there’s a damn near 50/50 chance the episode of Info Wars they’re going to be tearing apart will culminate with a drunken, crying, screaming, Alex Jones temper tantrum.

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        For the past year or so there are some pretty telling signs of what is most likely cocaine added to the mix.

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          which is actively counteracting the damage done by alcoholism, the globalists WISH they had his super powered organs

          • Billiam@lemmy.world
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            Not to mention all the SUPER MAIL VITALITY BRAIN FARCE X pills filled with god knows what.

      • Billiam@lemmy.world
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        You say “vodka marinaded,” I say “well-preserved!”

        Also what’s your bright spot today, buddy?

  • neidu2@feddit.nl
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    Can’t wait for Knowledge Fight to cover this. Last episode largely involved AJ not being present in thebstudio due to “having to deal with some bankruptcy matters”

  • BringMeTheDiscoKing@lemmy.ca
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    Awe c’mon. He was just speeching! Isn’t speeching protected? Don’t unfree his speech, why you hate liberdom and freedity?

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    This is Great… Unfortunately this is too little too late …

    He’s already moved out every asset he owns from under his control to other sources. They’ve given this man too much time to make himself appear “Virtually” as pauper on paper. He’ll go to prison before he ever gives them a cent.

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        Forensic auditors are scary. However, given the caliber of people Alex Jones surrounds himself with, I have a sneaking suspicion it wouldn’t be particularly difficult to untangle his finances (relatively speaking).

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        Even if they can trace it, can they take it? Let’s say he puts his house in a trust and makes some family members the owner of the trust, that would no longer be his property, no?

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          This article has the best breakdown I’ve ever read in a single source, but, from what I understand as a non-expert or even expert-adjacent, it doesn’t work that way.

          If you put things in a living trust and name others as the beneficiary and then file for bankruptcy, you still own those trusts. So they take the assets.

          If you put your assets in an irrevocable trust around the time that you file for bankruptcy and the recipient gives you something in return, the courts take the something you got in return. If you get nothing in return, then the auditors say “this smells like bullshit” and then the courts go, “yup, that’s definitely a coverup,” and then they reverse the trust and give you an extra punishment. If you’d established that trust well before filing for bankruptcy, then you didn’t have the money anyway, so nothing to take. But if the person who owns the trust is using the trust to financially support you, then the court will yoink the money before you spend it or they’ll spank you after you’ve spent it.

        • JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
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          If he puts it in a Swiss bank or caiman islands then they won’t release it for seizure or even admit it’s there. Everyone will know and he would likely be jailed for hiding it but once he got out it would be there still

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      Yeah, that’s not as hopeless as you think. They can easily track what he did to obviously hide his assets in the time since the judgement and still seize them from the parties who now could face charges for accepting them.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      Can the court do something to punish him if it looks like he’s living in luxury despite not owning any assets?

    • NateNate60@lemmy.world
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      In bankruptcy cases, a proposal is usually put forth by the end of the process that describes a plan with respect to how the debtor’s assets will be liquidated and the funds distributed to creditors. This plan is put to a vote before the creditors and if the creditors accept the plan, then the bankruptcy court will order that the debtor’s assets be liquidated in the manner described. When that’s all done, the bankruptcy trustee will distribute the proceeds according to the plan to the creditors. Any remaining debts are cancelled.

      • BorgDrone@lemmy.one
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        Why are remaining debts cancelled? They should liquidate all his assets and then take every single cent he makes for the rest of his life.

        • mPony@lemmy.world
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          all of this, but maybe also have people constantly harassing him pushing a narrative about how none of it is actually happening, and that it never happened, and how he made everything up.

        • NateNate60@lemmy.world
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          This is how bankruptcy works. When someone goes bankrupt then it is intended to give them a fresh start. Some debts, such as those incurred as a result of fraud, are not dischargeable.

          • BorgDrone@lemmy.one
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            But why grant him bankruptcy? Where I live, personal bankruptcy isn’t really a thing. You can’t just walk away from debt and get a fresh start as you please. There is a ‘debt sanitation’ procedure but any creditors have to agree to the procedure and you have to go through a period of at least 3 years in which any income above the social minimum will be garnished and used to pay your debts. After this period outstanding debt can be discharged but this is entirely up to the discretion of each individual creditor.

            In this case, I do not see any reason why you would agree to that. Let him pay every cent he makes for the rest of his life.

            • NateNate60@lemmy.world
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              Edit: thought this was a reply to the Trump case. Edited to apply to Jones

              Bankruptcy is not “granted”. It is a legal process and courts cannot decline to bankrupt a person. This is the law in the United States, and changing it would require an Act of Congress. Nobody has to “agree” to this. It is just as much a violation of the rule of law to unduly deprive Jones of the rights he has by law as it is to ignore the consequences of his actions prescribed by law. It doesn’t matter what your opinion is of him or his actions; these are his rights. Anyone who has a crushing amount of debt that they can’t pay off, due to no particular fault of their own other than bad financial management, can have their assets liquidated and those debts cancelled. Note that debts incurred by fraud or malicious intent, such as this large judgement, are still not eligible for cancellation in bankruptcy. The purpose of personal bankruptcy laws around the world is because it is recognised that citizens are more economically productive when they aren’t forced to pay a crushing amount of debt for the rest of their lives. It isn’t fair to them. Again, we’re looking at laws that apply to everyone, so your opinion of Jones’s case doesn’t matter. It isn’t about Jones.

              Nobody “walks away” from debt. People get their assets liquidated, their properties sold off. and in many cases their lives upended by bankruptcy. Nobody will ever want to lend money to someone bankrupt. Since Jones declards personal bankruptcy then his business and assets will be sold to pay his creditors and he’ll be left with maybe enough to live an average life working an actual job. At the same time, the law stipulates that he, like everyone else, still deserves a decent standard of living even despite his debts. This is not favouritism, this is the rule of law.

              Consider the case where a person, after getting into a serious car accident, is hospitalised for two months. When they get out, now they could owe hundreds of thousands of dollars in hospital bills, could be severely behind on their mortgage, was out of work for two months so they might also owe thousands of dollars on their credit card, and may have even lost their job in the meantime. All those things are possible in the US, so you have to understand that bankruptcy is the last resort for this person. Otherwise, interest and late fees on tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt will crush them for the rest of their lives, and we (Americans) as a society have decided that we don’t want people in that position.

                • NateNate60@lemmy.world
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                  That’s probably some Ronald Reagan bullshit. Let me go look it up.

                  Edit: It’s not. Apparently it only started in 2005.

    • ripcord@lemmy.world
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      Well. Since it’s for sandy Hook families, by going back and having kids killed.i guess :(