Judge strips Alex Jones of bankruptcy protections against $1.5 billion awarded to Sandy Hook families

A federal bankruptcy judge ruled Monday that families of Sandy Hook school mass shooting victims can move forward against Alex Jones regarding the nearly $1.5 billion he’s ordered to pay them over conspiracy theories he helped spread about the event, the Associated Press reports.

Judge Christopher Lopez’s order lifted a stay that automatically halted the lawsuits against Jones when he filed for bankruptcy. The families cannot pursue collection efforts against him just yet, however.

As the AP points out, Jones filed for Chapter 11 personal bankruptcy protection earlier this month, citing $1 billion to $10 billion in liabilities and $1 million to $10 million in assets.

From the AP:

For years, Jones described the 2012 Sandy Hook massacre as a hoax. A Connecticut jury in October awarded victims’ families $965 million in compensatory damages, and a judge later tacked on another $473 million in punitive damages. Earlier in the year, a Texas jury awarded the parents of a child killed in the shooting $49 million in damages.

Jones has laughed at the awards on his Infowars show, saying he has less than $2 million to his name and won’t be able to pay such high amounts. Those comments contradicted the testimony of a forensic economist at the Texas trial, who said Jones and Free Speech Systems have a combined net worth as high as $270 million.