Alex Jones’ attorney Norm Pattis wants out of Sandy Hook case

NEWTOWN — In the first Connecticut court appearance since Alex Jones was sprung from bankruptcy protection to face a damages award trial for a defamation case he lost to Sandy Hook families, his New Haven-based attorneys asked to be dropped from the case.

“We are in an untenable position — our communication with our client has broken down,” said Cameron Atkinson, a lawyer who works with high-profile New Haven attorney Norm Pattis. “We have not had direct communication with our client in over a month.”

State Superior Court Judge Barbara Bellis said she has heard that story before. She listed 13 separate motions where Pattis and other attorneys have either replaced each other or asked to be dropped from Jones’ case over the last four years. In an unusually lengthy ruling, Bellis called it a “tortured history of appearances,” which was “convoluted and bizarre.”

Thursday’s hearing, which revealed that Jones is seeking to forestall a similar damages award trial in Texas where he lost two other defamation cases to Sandy Hook parents last year, is the latest development after a springtime saga that saw Jones seek bankruptcy protection for his business interests without seeking bankruptcy protection for himself. Lawyers for Sandy Hook families here and in Texas figured how to get their cases returned to state trial courts by simply dropping the Jones business entities in bankruptcy from their lawsuits.

It wasn’t a hard decision to make. The three Jones business entities in federal bankruptcy protection have a combined monthly income of $38,000. Jones made at least $76 million selling merchandise to his Infowars audience in 2019, his representatives said.

The bankruptcy cases revealed that Jones has not only spent $10 million on attorneys fees and has lost at least $20 million because of the Sandy Hook lawsuits, but Jones is concerned that his brand as the “Coca-Cola of the conspiracy theory community” may be suffering, his representatives said.


Lawyers for an FBI agent and eight Sandy Hook families who won a defamation case against Jones in Connecticut last year agreed with Bellis not to allow Pattis to withdraw from Jones’ case.

“The (families) oppose any action that could potentially delay the trial date in this case,” wrote Alinor Sterling from the Bridgeport firm Koskoff, Koskoff and Bieder. “Jury selection is scheduled to begin on Aug. 2, 2022, and trial is scheduled to begin on Sept. 1.”

During a Thursday morning court conference in Waterbury, Bellis ordered Pattis and Atkinson to continue representing Jones until she rules on the matter on June 15.