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I have only kind of paid attention to this case so I will not claim deep legal knowledge here, but I suspect this case is, like so many others, one in which the deep legal details matter, and are mostly ignored by partisans in favor of "He's being punished by the Elites for offending the NWO" or "He's an evil monster who mocked dead children."
A number like $1.5 billion is basically saying "We're taking everything you have (except your home)." Is that a fair judgment? Eh. I don't feel sorry for him, and not just because he's a crank.
My understanding is that the huge judgment was not so much because he claimed Sandy Hook was a hoax and told parents their children didn't really die (vile and obnoxious and possibly cause for a defamation suit, but not $1.5 billion), but because of all those followers of his who harassed and threatened the parents for years. So as to whether he is responsible at all: having some crazy followers who do things without your knowledge or instigation is one thing, but if you keep beating the "crisis actor" drums for years, until you know darn well what your followers are doing to those parents, then at some point yeah, I think you become responsible for continuing to egg them on. That and his legal fuckery with the court makes me think he FAAFO.
And if someone assassinates Trump, can Trump Jr bankrupt Maddow?
It is a very slippery slope to apply an “egging on” standard.
All laws are slippery slopes. I never understand this argument: "If you took this principle to an unreasonable extreme, terrible things will happen." Well, yes.
Trump Jr. suing Maddow on the premise that her bashing of Trump directly and intentionally or recklessly instigated an assassination would have to prove a lot of things beyond "Maddow said Trump bad."
Maybe things like calling him a threat to democracy or a Russian plant etc etc. not that dissimilar to what Jones did to be honest.
Law is supposed to have procedures that protect the defendant as much as it provides vindication to the plaintiff. For example, there is a limitation on unreasonable fines. This seems like a paradigmatic unreasonable fine.
If hordes of Maddow's followers started physically harassing Trump and she seemed to be egging it on (or at least conspicuously silent about it), he might have a case. But as others have pointed out, Jones's legal troubles were not just because of what he said, but because when sued he tried to play shell games with his finances.
This narrative some of you are swallowing where Alex Jones got sued to oblivion for the crime of wrongthink and offending liberals just doesn't hold up. The judgment may be absurd, but not for the reasons you are claiming.
What’s the standard here? If people tried to break into his home whilst burning historic churches next to where he then lived would that count?
Can you show that that was done by Rachel Maddow followers as a result of things she said? Can you show that it was happening for months or years? Can you show that she knew (or should have known) that it was happening, and did nothing about it?
No but we also can’t prove it was done as a result of Jones’ followers. Causation is really hard (people hear a lot of stuff and do random things all of the time).
That's what trials are for. If you believe the court was in error in finding Alex Jones responsible, I'd like to know why you think that, and if it is based on actually examining the arguments heard and their reasoning, or if your objection is based purely on the principals (not principles) involved.
The Alex Jones verdict did not establish that anyone with a media following who says mean things about someone is responsible for any harassment that person receives, and I don't think you actually believe that's what happened here.
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