A bank recently shut down the accounts of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones’ media company, citing unauthorized transactions — a move that caused panic at the business when its balances suddenly dropped from more than $2 million to zero, according to a lawyer for the company.
The action last week by Axos Bank also exposed worry and doubt at the company, Free Speech Systems, about being able to find another bank to handle its money.
Jones, a conservative provocateur whose Infowars program promotes fake theories about global conspiracies, UFOs and mind control, is seeking bankruptcy protection as he and his company owe $1.5 billion to relatives of victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Connecticut.
This is the underlying problem with how we use money as a proxy for power. As soon as someone signs something into their family’s name it becomes nearly inaccessible to the justice system, because of due process and corporate personhood. Bank transfers are pretty instantaneous nowadays, the justice systems are very much not. Which leaves these families on years-long time-consuming expensive missions to force any blood from that stone.
I have a zany idea for partially remedying this. Send the person to actual prison when it becomes clear that the companies they have a financial interest in have not shown progress on divesting their assets and removing the person from the business, let’s say after 1 month - just enough to appoint an independent auditor. No professional communication with the person except via their lawyers and auditor. Economic sanctions for all companies dealing with that person until all appeals are exhausted, except their lawyers. No merchandise deals, movies, supplements contracts, guest hosting on Steven Crowder’s podcast, none of that.
If businesses have legal personhood, it’s time to start applying personal consequences for the key decision-makers of those companies when they commit crimes or facilitate the people avoiding consequences.
I mean if corporations are people, why can’t we send corporations to prison?
Who is still buying $2.5 million dollars worth of Alex Jones Crap a month?
Scumbags and the mentally ill
There’s a lot of ignorant people with money in this country.
It’s stunning. More ignorant and dishonest people walk on crimes, too, than smart, honest, but hapless/scapegoats.
Yes he is an asshole. Yes he deserves to lose all his money. Yes he should/has to pay the victims of sand hook.
My question is what happens to the money in the account? Can the bank just say we are not willing to do business with you anymore and keep it?
If this was me or you, can a bank just deny you access to the money in your account?
I would think… And I am no expert… They could say “we don’t want your business anymore, take the money out of your accounts within 30 days or it’s forfiet” or something. But to think the bank can just close the account and keep the money seems really bad in my eyes.
They’re not keeping the money:
“He said the bank informed Jones’ company that it would be sending a cashier’s check for the total balance.”In this case, the bank is just saying, “You’re no longer our customer,” and sending him a cashier’s check for the balance / value of his accounts.
In other cases, where the authorities have seized the accounts, the assets are frozen. The bank will turn it over to the authorities (federal, state, whatever) where the monies will generally be kept in an interest-bearing account that keeps track with inflation or similar but otherwise remain inaccessible to the original owner until the legal matters are resolved.
The only time, setting aside simple banking errors, the Bank would keep it is if the Bank is owed money anyway. LIke say, Jones had a huge set of outstanding loans he’d refused to pay. The Bank would simply take funds from the deposit acocunts and use them to pay down the loan(s).
It is.
The fact he hasn’t paid out a dime or seen a single millisecond of jail time should show you whose side the legal system is really on.
