Alex Jones pitches bankruptcy deal that pays him $520k a year

Alex Jones has pitched a bankruptcy plan for his media company that would pay the Infowars host $520,000 while giving $7m to $10m annually to the families of the Sandy Hook shooting victims.

The families won almost $1.5bn in lawsuits against Jones last year for his claims that the 2012 mass shooting was a hoax.

Twenty children and six adults were murdered in the shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, and the families told a Texas court that Jones’s followers harassed them over the deaths.

Jones has appealed the verdicts and has claimed on the air that he has $2m to his name.

His company Free Speech Systems, of which he is the sole owner, filed a proposed reorganisation plan in its Chapter 11 bankruptcy case in Houston on Tuesday, according to the Associated Press.

In the filing, the company predicted that after expenses it would have between $7m and $10m to pay creditors from 2023 to 2027. It would be up to a judge to decide how the money is allocated.

The filing predicts that the company expects to sell more than $30m a year in dietary supplements, which Jones promotes on the show.

Documents state that Jones and a new chief operating officer would both be paid $520,000 a year, and executive incentives would be between $560,000 and $1.3m per year.

In addition, it would spend between $352,000 and $677,000 on employee bonuses per year, while spending up to $940,000 on wages for its more than 40 employees. And it would pay up to $1m annually to contract employees.

Jones, who has also filed for personal bankruptcy, said on air in December that he was “out of money personally.”

“It’s all going to be filed. It’s all going to be public. And you will see that Alex Jones has almost no cash,” he insisted.

During one of his trials last year, a forensic economist testified that Jones and his company were worth around $270m.

In court documents, Jones says he owns three properties in Austin, Texas, a plot of land valued at $1.5m, three vehicles, two boats, two guns and a cat.

Jones also stated that he has monthly expenses of more than $96,000, including $14,000 on childcare and education and $10,000 in alimony and child support.