EXTREME right-wing talk radio host Alex Jones has filed for bankruptcy as he faces nearly $1.5 billion (£1.2bn) in damages over conspiracy theories he spread about the Sandy Hook school massacre.
Infowars host Jones filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in bankruptcy court in Houston, Texas.
His filing lists between $1bn to $10bn in liabilities (£820 million to £8.2bn).
The bankruptcy filing comes as Jones faces court orders to pay nearly $1.5bn in damages to relatives of victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut for calling the massacre a hoax.
A total of 26 people were killed by a gunman at the school in Newtown, 20 of them children.
In October, a Connecticut jury awarded the families $965m in compensatory damages (£792m), and a judge later tacked on another $473m (£388m) in punitive damages.
Earlier in the year, a Texas jury awarded the parents of a child killed in the shooting 49 million dollars (£40m) in damages.
Jones has laughed at the awards on his Infowars show, saying he has less than $2m (£1.6m) to his name and will not be able to pay such high amounts.
The comments contradicted the testimony of a forensic economist at the Texas trial, who said Jones and his company Free Speech Systems have a combined net worth as high as $270m (£221m).
Free Speech Systems is also seeking bankruptcy protection.
In documents filed in Free Speech Systems’ bankruptcy case in Texas, a budget for the company for October 29 to November 25 estimated product sales would total $2.5m (£2m), while operating expenses would be about $740,000 (£607,000). Jones’s salary was listed at $20,000 dollars (£16,400) every two weeks.
