That doesnt mean it was a reasonable amount.
The normal corrective for such a thing is to appeal the amount of the award, on the grounds that it is clearly unreasonable. For Alex Jones, it probably didn't matter - he was bankrupt either way, so the extreme amount of the award is just a middle finger from the jury, with no practical effect.
That can come from broken systems as easily as a dictator.
It is hard for me to imagine what would support 150 million per plaintiff. That is and order of magnitude more civil damages than are often awarded for cold blooded murder.
Everyone hates Alex Jones, and I don't like him either, but that shouldn't trump justice and proportionality. It makes me think that the penalty was for more than what was on trial, and rather a reflection of mob justice by other means.
I mean that the system prosecutes these kinds of cases seemingly quite unfairly, as with Assange, or some of the maneuvers against Russell Brand, and that the actions just so happen to mesh with the interests of those in power.
People can claim that everything is OK because, court of law, etc, but to me the system is clearly not delivering correct answers.
Oh "we would have made 10 billion if everyone downloading illegally would have paid." Except of course most people wouldn't have bothered if it wasn't free.
So, how much is 1.5B, per 'victim' of some obvious crackpots' rants.
The courts might as well have assigned a 1 trillion dollars of damages.
Someone should get to lie and spread conspiracy theories for decades and have to only pay a little? The man had been doing it because he could, not because he didn’t understand it was a lie. Then when called out and asked to stop, he kept doing it.
show some actual, material damage.
If you are saying the fine is an appropriate punishment because of harm done to some other people, than that itself is illiberal. That isn't what Jones was on trial for.
That is intentionally giving an excessive penalty because you want to punish them for something else, that certainly wasn't litigated, and may not even be a crime.
Do you understand how people might be uncomfortable with that logic?
The fines are mostly punitive, which I frankly support. Why? Because Jones deserves it. If anything, Jones should consider himself lucky to be surrounded by such outstanding citizens that they go through the legal system instead of taking matters into their own hands.
Maybe if it was someone else I would care more. But for him, I can't bring myself to care much. Maybe that's illogical, but I don't mind much. Life is always a case-by-case basis.
Still waiting on your more appropriate number.
https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:s6j27rxb3ic2rxw73ixgqv2p/po...
If he wanted to avoid losing a billion and a half dollars, he sure went about it oddly.