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Comment by paganel | Hacker News Reader

Blatantly copying from Twitter [1], but it's what I believe, also:

> The largest fine paid by a banking executive responsible for the 2008 Financial Crisis was $67.5 million

A few tens of millions would have set straight almost everyone involved, the victims getting their money, Jones having to pay out of his pocket. But $1 billion means Jones will never be able to pay the sum, and, what's more, it will also silence him indefinitely. Which will make lots of his supporters think that was the intention all along, and in so doing making a mockery out of the act of justice.

[1] https://twitter.com/WSBChairman/status/1580289631714947072

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> But $1 billion means Jones will never be able to pay the sum, and, what's more, it will also silence him indefinitely.

How does it do that?

You don't need billions or even millions to practice your free speech rights. Jones still has a website with a huge reader/viewership last I checked, which is far more reach than he'd have using the last backstop platform of free speech: literally speaking standing on a box in the town square.

Many people like him who have been demonetized on mainstream platforms because of content policy violations continue to operate with the financing of wealthy private donors who share their beliefs and agendas.

Furthermore, there are plenty of media companies that would probably hire him as a paid commentator or to host an entertainment show where he continues to talk about the subjects over which he isn't being sued for defamation. They would probably pay him well enough to pay these damages for years to come and still live a comfortable life.

He can also keep selling his dietary supplements to his audience who seem to believe in their efficacy.

He just can't slander the Sandy Hook families anymore without fear of financial repercussions.

Jones is already back on his show deriding the victims, saying he won't pay, and soliciting money. Given his conspiratorial bent and the type of people who support him, I wouldn't be surprised if this doesn't hurt him as much as you'd think, because it reinforces their world view and will make them double down even further. Even if he ends up paying out substantial amounts, which would take years, I think he'll be just fine. The only thing that would really take him out would be if he went to jail for fraud or something.

This is only a good point if you think that the fines that the banking executives paid in 2008 were sufficient. I'm not sure I've ever heard anyone express that opinion. The fine here is fully justified. The lack of fines in 2008 is the problem, not this.

>The fine here is fully justified.

A billion dollar fine is justified because idiots read his blog and decided a baseless conspiracy theory seemed plausible?

That's laughable. I didn't think I'd ever find myself on the same side of something as Alex Jones and yet here I am. These people lost their minds.

That's literally how tort damages work. The inverse of your logic would imply that defamation wouldn't be actionable at all; reputation damage, after all, concerns entirely what unrelated third parties do with your misstatements.

Yes because thinking a BILLION dollar fine is absurd for saying dumb shit online, clearly means there should be no torts at all.

What it really means is for this fine to make sense, we need to start fining other people and companies TRILLIONS. I feel like I'm in an Austin Powers movie, or worse, on Reddit.

What if he made 1.2 Billion off of his grift that attacked actual people?

He isn’t going to jail (which seems like it should be in play to me).

He’s just not able to keep any of his ill gotten gains. It’s really hard to feel sympathetic here.

We don't need to ask "what if" because we know he made nothing remotely close to a billion. So now what?

If the judgement holds, all his liquidatable assets will be seized and his wages will be garnished perpetually until the total amount is paid or he is put in the ground. Not super complicated, I don't think?

I think you replied to the wrong comment, this response does not follow the post that was being replied to.

Jones will appeal and the amount will be dropped, probably nearly 10 fold, which puts the payout in a range that Jones company has made.

It's like "babies first day in court" in this thread with all the ridiculous crap being said.

It's not a BILLION. It's a BILLION divided by fifteen plaintiffs, which brings the per-plaintiff number to a high-but-precedented number.

The total number is nosebleed-high because Jones managed to be culpable for one of the most egregious defamation cases in 50 years against more than a dozen people simultaneously.

Also, because he boycotted the trial and lost it by default.

You say it's precedented, can you cite the precedence? The guy is/was a conspiracy blogger, that's it. You would think he destroyed the housing market or droned thousands of innocent children with that sort of fine. Which is what makes it so absurd.

Can I cite the precedent of an individual plaintiff winning more than $50MM in a civil judgement? Sure. Hulk Hogan won $115MM in the Gawker case.

>Can I cite the precedent of an individual plaintiff winning more than $50MM in a civil judgement?

No, can you cite a precedent for someone being ordered to pay almost a billion dollars for saying a mean thing on a blog. You said it's precedented, I was asking for the precedent.

Oof. I'll do the sentence diagramming for you.

OP said: "It's not a BILLION. It's a BILLION divided by fifteen plaintiffs, which brings the per-plaintiff number to a high-but-precedented number."

Th adjective "precedented" modifies "number". In this sentence, "number" refers to the quantity "a BILLION divided by fifteen plaintiffs".

Clearly, it's the per-plaintiff number that OP refers to as "precedented", not the total sum.

Figuring out that "precedented" refers to 1B/15 in the above sentence requires roughly a fifth grade reading level. The fact that InfoWars has an audience is become less surprising by the comment.

Yes, you've defined what makes the judgement absurd. And because it's multiplicative and due solely to "mean words said on blog", then that leaves sane people to see how ridiculous the whole thing is.

Imagine for a minute if Trump decided to sue everyone who called him a Russian agent on TV or in writing. The award would be in the trillions.

I'm enjoying this educational thread from the side / all sides, and trying to stay a reader more than participant as I'm not a lawyer, but I don't feel this can be honestly characterized as "mean things said in internet". This was repeated, wilful, cognizant and extremely damaging willification of inocent people, as well as causing and inciting real action and damage, to a massive audience. If I repeatedly and authoritatively tell millions of people to kill themselves, that's not "mean thing said on blog". If I repeatedly and authoritatively tell millions of people that murdered children were actors and incite my audience to action, that's not "mean things said on a blog". Discussion is much more interesting and productive if everybody engages in basic intellectual honesty in making their argument.

> No, can you cite a precedent for someone being ordered to pay almost a billion dollars for saying a mean thing on a blog.

You're obsessing with the fact that the total of the individual damage awards is so high. But under the law, if you defame a lot of people, they each get their own individual damage awards; they don't have to share some abstract or artificial dollar amount between them.

So you want examples of high-dollar online defamation awards? LMGTFY: A Nevada guy won a $38 million jury verdict [0]. Three New Hampshire businessmen won a jury verdict of $274 million for defamatory billboards accusing them of being crooks [1]. A South Carolina mayor won a $50 million jury verdict against someone who sent defamatory emails [2]. I haven't looked to see whether these all stood up on appeal; feel free to do your own research.

[0] https://www.robertdmitchell.com/internet-defamation

[1] https://www.nhpr.org/nh-news/2017-09-29/jury-awards-record-b...

[2] https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/south-carolina/artic...

> make lots of his supporters think that was the intention all along

His listeners believe that the literal devil controls the government, Hollywood, and the minds of liberal minded people. His listeners believe that Klaus Schwab secretly controls the United States and that his goal is to feminize men and cut off children's sex organs. His listeners believe that Sandy Hook never happened and the parents are crisis actors. His listeners will believe all kinds of insane things but that has nothing to do whether justice should be served or not.

Interesting and brave take to defend a real scumbag.

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