Lawyers 'Messed Up,' Sending Alex Jones' Texts to Opponents

Alex Jones said in a sworn deposition that there's nothing on his cellphone about the Sandy Hook school massacre. That position became uncomfortable Wednesday when the Infowars host was on the stand in his defamation trial in Texas and learned that his lawyers "messed up." Mark Bankston, a lawyer for the parents of a 6-year-old boy killed in the 2012 shooting, showed the witness a copy of a text message sent to Jones that was critical of his claim that the killings were faked, the Guardian reports. After accusing Bankston of a "nice trick," Jones was told how the lawyer had gotten the text. "Your attorneys messed up and sent me a digital copy of your entire cellphone," Bankston said, "with every text message you've sent for the past two years."

Bankston added, "That is how I know you lied when you said you didn't have text messages about Sandy Hook." Jones answered that if he was trying to hide something, he wouldn't have given his phone to his attorneys. "If I was mistaken, I was mistaken," Jones said about the phone's contents, sarcastically telling Bankston he just had a "Perry Mason moment." Bankston delivered sarcasm of his own, asking Jones, "You know what perjury is, right?" The plaintiffs' attorney said he informed Jones' lawyers about their mistake, but they didn't try to keep the texts out of the courtroom by designating them as privileged.

Jones, who's being sued for at least $150 million, said on the stand Wednesday that he now understands the Sandy Hook mass shooting was "100% real," per NPR. He said meeting the parents helped him to that realization. The surfacing of his texts led to another complication for Jones on Wednesday. The House committee investigating the attack on the Capitol quickly decided it would like to see those texts, per Rolling Stone, and is preparing its request for the data. It's not clear what specific information the panel is looking for, but the committee has been looking into Jones' part in advocating the insurrection, as well as his ties to Stewart Rhodes, leader of the Oath Keepers. (More Alex Jones stories.)