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​Father Of Sandy Hook Victim Forced To Give Interview In Disguise For Protection

​Father Of Sandy Hook Victim Forced To Give Interview In Disguise For Protection

Lenny Pozner’s six-year-old son Noah was the youngest person killed during the 14 December massacre

Jess Hardiman

Jess Hardiman

The father of a child killed during the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting has had to give a TV interview in heavy disguise for his own protection, having been subject to abuse from conspiracy theorists.

Lenny Pozner's six-year-old son Noah was the youngest person killed during the 14 December massacre, which left 20 school children and six staff members dead.

Noah Pozner.
CBS

Pozner spoke to CBS' 60 Minutes about what he'd been through in the wake of losing his son - but not before a team of makeup artists altered his facial features to help protect his identity.

During a segment about a campaign fighting to make social media companies be held responsible for the content allowed online, Pozoner said: "I was being attacked for the memory of my son," Pozner explained in the interview.

"My son's very short life was being attacked, and I just wasn't going to stand for that."

Pozner has worked hard to fight back against his trolls, which is something that has made him a target for conspiracy theorists, who argue that no one died in the school shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, and that it had been part of a plot led by Barack Obama to rid the US of guns.

CBS

He has even managed to win settlements against people who have spread such conspiracies, including a 2019 defamation case against editors of a book that claimed there had been no deaths.

In June 2017, Lucy Reynolds was also sentenced to five months in a Florida jail for messages she sent to Pozner.

In one, Reynolds, 57, said: "Death is coming to you real soon and nothing you can do about it."

CBS

When asked on 60 Minutes what form the conspiracy theories took, Pozner continued: "Conversations denying the tragedy. Accusing the government of staging it.

"That Noah did not die; that I'm not Noah's father. It all revolves around the notion that these are staged shootings, scripted events, that I'm an actor, that I'm paid, to fake the death of a child."

After falling victim to conspiracy theorists' abuse, Pozner founded the HONR Network to help others in similar situations.

Featured Image Credit: CBS

Topics: News, US News