NRA Official Reached Out to Sandy Hook Truther About Parkland Shooting

Emails show that one day after the Parkland shooting, NRA official Mark Richardson theorized the shooter was not alone and had assistance.

NRA Official Reached Out to Sandy Hook Truther About Parkland Shooting

Photo via Adobe by Mark Richardson

The Huffington Post recently obtained emails between a National Rifle Association (NRA) official and a prominent Sandy Hook conspiracy theorist who question last year’s school shooting in Parkland, Fla.

NRA officer Mark Richardson got in touch with Wolfgang Halbig, who has been known to harass parents of Sandy Hook Elementary School victims and spout theories about the shooting.

“Just like [Sandy Hook], there is so much more to this story,” Richardson wrote in an email on Feb. 15, 2018 – one day after the shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. “[The Parkland shooter] was not alone.”

Richardson has worked at the NRA since 2006 as a training instructor and program coordinator.

The NRA released a statement on Thursday that said, “any suggestion that the unspeakable atrocities committed by an evil lunatic were faked as part of an elaborate hoax are insane.”

The organization has not mentioned any action it would take against Richardson.

Richardson went on to question whether the Parkland shooter had assistance gaining access to the school since he passed through the front doors with a backpack containing a gun.

“No one else seems to be interested enough to even ask the question?” Richardson added. “No longer a student, why was he allowed in the building at all?”

Richardson questioned the official account of the Parkland shooting and concluded there were others involved in the shooting besides the gunman, saying, “He was not alone.”

The emails between Richardson and Halbig came to light amidst the ongoing lawsuit between Infowars host Alex Jones and Sandy Hook parent Scarlett Lewis. Infowars has been deemed a far-right American conspiracy and fake news website.

“I had just spent the past six hours reading thousands of disturbing emails Mr. Halbig sent to government agencies, political groups and media organizations soliciting support for his dangerous fixation on Sandy Hook,” said Brooke Binkowski, editor of TruthOrFiction.com and a consultant for Lewis’ attorneys.

“I was shocked when that support came from an NRA official in 2018,” Binkowski added.

Lewis is suing Jones and his show for intentional infliction of emotional distress, after Jones falsely called the victims of Sandy Hook “crisis actors,” for years. Nine other Sandy Hook parents are suing Jones in separate lawsuits.

Jones is also facing a defamation lawsuit for falsely identifying someone as a Parkland shooter after Infowars published a story titled “Video: Second Shooter Reported in Florida Massacre.”

Halbig, an Infowars contributor, has actively spread false statements about the victims of Sandy Hook, including a theory that six-year-old Avielle Richman never died in the Sandy Hook shooting.

Jeremy Richman, Avielle’s father, died Monday by suspected suicide.

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Katie Malafronte is Campus Safety's Web Editor. She graduated from the University of Rhode Island in 2017 with a Bachelor's Degree in Communication Studies and a minor in Writing & Rhetoric. Katie has been CS's Web Editor since 2018.

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One response to “NRA Official Reached Out to Sandy Hook Truther About Parkland Shooting”

  1. Rick says:

    So what. More importantly, the AR that the media said was used is shown in the trunk of the car he used to get to the scene. Liberals want to ban the AR, but not the car that he used to commit his heinous crime. Also, why is there video of several people giving interviews that belong to the actors guild; one was a witness in a neighborhood that gave inconsistent interviews and the other was a “dad” that was smiling and talking with people and as he walks to the podium, begins to wipe away a tear……but was laughing seconds earlier.

    Most importantly, ALL of the mass shooters, with the exception of the terror related ones, have ALL been using psychotropic drugs, but no one holds doctors, drug companies or pharmacies responsible, but want to sue gun manufacturers. How about banning psychotropic drugs that have side effects of homicidal and suicidal reactions.

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