Alex Jones reaching red-level terror alert


Parents of two children murdered in the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting filed defamation lawsuits on Monday against right-wing conspiracy theorist and radio show host Alex Jones, who has questioned the authenticity of the attack that left 26 dead, including 20 children.


Two sets of parents are seeking more than $1 million in damages in separate lawsuits. The two defamation cases were filed in Austin, Texas, where Jones lives and has espoused claims that the massacre was "a giant hoax" and "that the whole thing was fake" — staged by the federal government, which hired professional actors for the purposes of undermining Second Amendment rights.


Sandy Hook memorial, possibly staged by CNN


The lawsuits chronicle a number of articles published on InfoWars.com as well as broadcasts hosted by Jones in which the plaintiffs say he waged a "years-long campaign to convince their audience that Sandy Hook was faked and that the parents are lying."


In one case, the court documents point to an episode of The Alex Jones Show called Sandy Hook Vampires Exposed, in which Jones alleged CNN used green screens in its coverage of the shooting. As evidence, Jones claimed footage of CNN host Anderson Cooper contained several glitches because of a poorly placed green screen. The lawsuit, however, explains the reason for the video anomalies: "The visual effect described by Mr. Jones is the result of motion compensation video compression."


The families filing the suits also say Jones' allegations led some of his listeners to make death threats against the victims' families.