Opinion | Alex Jones’s Sandy Hook Reckoning

He built a business on red-faced ranting, which is protected by the First Amendment, but he’s paying for defamation, which isn’t. Alex Jones used his talk show to spread theories that the Sandy Hook massacre was a hoax perpetrated by actors. A Texas jury this month awarded Neil Heslin and Scarlett Lewis, the parents of a slain 6-year-old, $49 million in damages.

That amount could drop on judicial review, but Mr. Jones also has been held liable in other Sandy Hook cases, which aren’t yet at the damages stage. He has lost by default judgment, after failing to turn over documents or comply with the judicial process. One of his companies has filed for bankruptcy. Mr. Jones’s reaction to this months’s jury, his lawyer said, was that “the First Amendment is under siege, and that he looks forward to continuing to fight.”