Alex Jones, a far-right conspiracy theorist, was sentenced to pay almost $1 billion in damages to the relatives of the Sandy Hook school shooting victims on Wednesday for falsely claiming the incident was a fabrication.

The $965m (£870m) compensation judgment was reached by a jury in Waterbury, Connecticut, after a three-week civil trial, not far from where a shooter killed 20 children and six staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary in the bloodiest school shooting in U.S. history.

During closing statements last week, attorneys for the relatives of eight victims stated that Mr. Jones profited for years from lies about the shooting, which attracted traffic to his website InfoWars and promoted sales of its products.

If forced to pay the whole sum, InfoWars may be forced to declare bankruptcy. This is one of the biggest defamation judgments in U.S. history.

Mr. Jones, 48, spread false information for years, alleging the massacre was staged as part of a government scheme to disarm Americans, that it was a "false flag" incident, and that the victims' parents were "crisis actors."

Attorney Chris Mattei stated that the families endured a decade-long campaign of harassment and death threats from Mr. Jones' millions of followers.

Mark Barden, whose son Daniel was murdered, reported that Jones' fans verbally assaulted and even followed him while shouting that he was a liar. He also stated that the grave of his son was vandalized.

Mr. Mattei told the jury, "Every single one of these families was drowning in grief, and Alex Jones stepped right on top of them."

Norman Pattis, another attorney, encouraged them to disregard the political undertones of the case.

"This is not a political case," Mr. Pattis stated. "The issue is the amount of compensation for the plaintiffs."

The trial was highlighted by weeks of harrowing testimony from the relatives, who filled the courtroom each day and recounted how Mr. Jones' lies about Sandy Hook exacerbated their pain. Additionally, a responding FBI agent is a plaintiff in the case.

Mr. Jones, who has now admitted that the shooting took place, also testified and briefly threw the trial into disarray as he attacked his "liberal" opponents and refused to apologize to the families.

Due to the absence of a cap on punitive penalties under Connecticut's Unfair Trade Practices Act, Mr. Jones faced the highest financial risk in this case.

It occurred two months after another jury in Austin, Texas, where Infowars is headquartered, ruled that Mr. Jones and his firm must pay $49.3 million to Sandy Hook parents in a similar case.

Mr. Jones's attorneys have stated that they want to challenge the majority of the award in the Texas case before it is approved by a judge, citing excessive state law.

Having lost a slander claim, he is currently awaiting a third Sandy Hook damages trial.