Wolfgang Halbig: Former Darling of the Sandy Hook Conspiracy Movement and ‘Nobody’

On December 14, 2012, Adam Lanza fatally shot his mother before murdering 20 students and six staff members at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. He then turned the gun on himself as Newtown police officers arrived at the scene. Since then, a number of fringe figures have promoted conspiracy theories that doubt or dispute the events that took place that day – claiming, for example, that the massacre was actually orchestrated by the U.S. Government as part of an elaborate plot to promote stricter gun control laws. By far the most popular of these conspiracy theorists is the radio show host, Alex Jones.

Alex, who once said that “Sandy Hook is a synthetic, completely fake, with actors, in my view, manufactured”, is now claiming that he was simply reporting on the conspiracy. Yet, before YouTube removed his channel for violating their terms of service, Alex had multiple videos where he perpetuated misinformation about the tragedy and asserted that the families of the victims were liars and fraudsters who helped in a cover up. These grieving parents have since been the victims of harassment from those who believe Jones. Some have received death threats, whilst others have been forced to move home several times in an effort to escape the harassment. 

Earlier in the year, I took it upon myself to fact check one of Alex’s many videos on the subject. The video I chose was titled, “FBI Says Nobody Killed at Sandy Hook Massacre” which was a 30-minute interview between Alex and the prominent Sandy Hook conspiracy theorist, Wolfgang Halbig. In the video, the two discussed what they considered to be the best evidence for a conspiracy, which can be boiled down to them misreading paperwork, misinterpreting a 2-second aerial video clip, and not understanding how chroma-keying works. 

The focus of my video was on Alex and not Wolfgang, who I dismissed as “some nobody”. My blatant disrespect infuriated many who believe in the conspiracy, and they soon took to my comments section where they informed me of Wolfgang’s credentials. It turns out that he is an expert in school shootings, and was hired by the U.S. government as an advisor after the Columbine massacre. If you look a bit deeper, you find out that Wolfgang says he is also a former Florida State Trooper, United States Customs Inspector, and Chief Investigator for the Children’s Safety Institute. 

I also believe I offended the man himself, after I received an email from one of his associates, Tony Mead. Tony, who was an admin for the now-removed Sandy Hook Hoax Facebook page, and helped with the production of the bore-fest which is, “We Need to Talk About Sandy Hook”, informed me that both he and Wolfgang would very much like to debate me. I declined the offer, stating that I don’t do debates, as I feel more can be accomplished by a well-researched back and forth. I also said that I welcome corrections from Wolfgang, so long as they are concise and referenced to speed up my response. I was then told that talking to the likes of me would be a waste of his time, which I found both confusing (because they contacted me) and rather cowardly. 

If my comments section is anything to go by, many who watched my video believed that I was being overly flippant when I called Wolfgang “some nobody”, however, the truth is that I chose my words very carefully. This might surprise my detractors, but I did spend a rather large amount of time looking into Wolfgang and his credentials before making the video, and I knew exactly what kind of person he is. 

In this blog, I am only going to give the abridged version of Wolfgang’s employment history and only lightly touch on some of the claims made by him and his supporters. If you are interested in a more in-depth chronicle of Wolfgang’s life, I suggest you read ‘Wolfgang Halbig: The Hoax of a Lifetime’.

Investigating Wolfgang’s credentials is no easy task, and I have nothing but respect for the people who have relentlessly syphoned though the garbage to discover the truth. You see, Wolfgang is constantly rewriting his background and embellishing his achievements and positions, which are then amplified and distorted by his supporters. Wolfgang is also fond of flat-out lying, like when he claimed to have drove in a motorcade protecting Martin Luther King Jr as a State Trooper, despite the fact he joined the force after MLK’s assassination. He once said that he was assigned to guard President Nixon and, therefore, has Top Secret clearance. We have ZERO evidence for this claim, despite the fact that Wolfgang’s life has been so well documented that I could tell you what freshman girl he believed to be “the most datable” whilst at University……it’s Linda Williamson and, “Wolf ought to know because, when it comes to women, Wolf is unparalleled”.

Wolfgang often talks about the time he spent as a Florida State Trooper, but often fails to mention that he was only a trooper from 1974-1975. In this short time, he apparently witnessed over 200 autopsies, was shot at multiple times, and was responsible for conducting “homicide investigations”. In reality, the Florida Highway Patrol does not use troopers for anything other than traffic. If they are called to assist the Sheriff’s Office, or any of the smaller metropolitan police departments, they would only be asked to create perimeters and to clear traffic, or handle traffic control. Their job is not to investigate murders or other horrific crimes that he mentioned, as they would be handled by the County police or the City police. It also should be noted that potential Florida State Troopers are required to attend an academy for twenty-seven weeks before graduating and being put on a probationary period for one year. This means that Wolfgang never surpassed the probationary or rookie portion of the job, yet we are meant to believe that he witnessed over 200 autopsies, was shot at multiple times, and was responsible for conducting “homicide investigations”.

On his resume, Wolfgang states that he was a customs inspector from 1993-1994 which, coincidentally, happens to be the same time he was also the Assistant Principal at Lake Mary High School. Over 20 years later, he still touts his short experience working for U.S. Customs, and likes to pretend that it somehow gives him a current inside into drug flow into his area. 

“I worked part time for U.S. Customs. So I know what is happening and keep up with the latest information on the drug flow in our area” – Wolfgang Halbig

Once again, reality is very different from the world according to Wolfgang. Yes, he did work for the U.S. Customs Service, but only at an entry-level and part-time, and he seems to not have taken much in, as in the same year, he was trying to sell phony bomb detectors to the schools he worked at. 

The Quadro Tracker, also known as the Positive Molecular Locator, was a fake “detection device” that its manufacturer claimed could detect hidden drugs, explosives, weapons, alcohol, precious metals, dead pets, wild game animals, and lost golf balls. They were sold by the QUADRO Corporation from 1993 to 1996 at a cost of between $400 and $8,000 per unit. To use the device, you must first insert a “locator card”, which contained the “signature” of the object to be detected, into a “card reader”, which could be attached to the user’s belt. This card reader was then connected by a short wire to a hand-held device, which had a horizontal swivelling rod that would point in the direction of the item being sought. The device worked by “static electricity produced by the body inhaling and exhaling gases into and out of the lung cavity” to “charge the free-floating neutral electrons of the signature card with the major strength of the signal”. Quadro Tracker and its successors, like ADE651, are nothing more than fancy looking dowsing rod devices, which have been thoroughly debunked over and over again. 

The eagle-eyed among you might have have recognised Wolfgang as the Quadro-certified operator in James Randi’s video. 

The first record of Wolfgang promoting the Quadro Tracker was in 1995, when he was the director of security for Seminole schools. He apparently wanted to buy one for every one of the districts’ 50 schools when, even at this early stage, many are skeptical about the devices legitimacy and the person promoting it. 

“…school security director Wolfgang Halbig wants to buy 50 ”drug-sniffing” electronic Quadro Trackers. My calculations say he would spend at least $19,750 of Seminole County taxpayers’ money for a device that the maker is afraid to patent and that uses ”voodoo” to find contraband with a method the maker can’t clearly explain. The U.S. Customs Service even tested it: The Quadro Tracker doesn’t work. Mr. Halbig: Don’t buy the Quadro Tracker and engage in fraud, waste and abuse of taxpayer money. If you want to find drugs in the schools, use dogs.”

You would think that someone who once worked for the U.S. Customs Service, and who still claims to this day to have connections, would know that they tested it and discovered it to be pure garbage. More people wrote letters voicing their concerns, and even openly mocked Wolfgang.

“QUICK, HOW can I get in touch with Wolfgang Halbig, security director for the Seminole County school district? He wants to buy 50 ”magic” drug-tracking devices to use in district schools at a cost approaching $50,000.
Tell him I’ve got a digitalized divining rod that’s guaranteed to find buried gold deposits under school properties. But he’s got to act fast. At the introductory price of $500 per, they’re selling like hotcakes! Quick! Get me in touch with this guy!”

Later, when questioned on Dateline NBC, Wolfgang would go on to say that he was almost fooled into buying the $1,000 device, but changed his mind since the FBI called it a fraud. He never explains how he came to be a Quadro-certified operator. 

Wolfgang and his supporters often claim that he was somehow involved, in some capacity, with the investigation of the Columbine massacre. However, so far, no-one has been able to find any evidence of any official involvement by Wolfgang whatsoever. They have found post-Columbine articles quoting him, and discovered that he seemed to be capitalising off the tragedy by pushing a private company that specialises in producing floor plans for every school, but that’s it. 

I could talk for days about Wolfgang, but I believe I have already made my point. I didn’t even have to mention that this “expert in school shootings” once got his gun stolen by a student. Nor did I have to talk about the time he failed to report mould in a school, which was giving him respiratory issues, because he was worried what the parents would say. Yep! Wolfgang needlessly put the health of Lake County’s children at risk whilst he was the Director of Security and Safety. 

The year after the Sandy Hook Elementary Massacre, Wolfgang started emailing various news agencies and government bodies expressing his suspicion that the shootings never took place. In one email to the FBI, he demanded that someone go to jail for failing to deal with the crisis as he would. He even went as far as to say that the EMTs/First responders were negligent, and should be charged for Manslaughter. He then began to email the Sandy Hook shooting survivors. 

Not content with harassing only people online, Wolfgang visited the Sandy Hook Volunteer Fire Department firehouse in 2014, where he accused one of the fireman of being complicit in the deaths of the children who died in the massacre. He then got into a confrontation with a fireman after refusing to leave the property and repeatedly saying, “You ought to be ashamed of yourself”.

When the firefighter closed the rolling doors to the firehouse, Wolfgang phoned the police and erroneously claimed that he had been assaulted.

Wolfgang was contacted by Len Pozner, father of Noah Pozner who was killed in the massacre. The email simply said, “I would like to speak to you on the phone”, to which Wolfgang responded by phoning the police, claiming that Len Pozner “tried to come to his house last night” but the security guards “wouldn’t let him through”.

Wolfgang, once again, phoned the police, claiming that Len Pozner was harassing him, and demanded to know why the father of a murdered child had not been arrested. The responding officer notes that “SUBJ IS S20” (Subject is Signal 20, code for a mentally ill person).

The whole time this was happening, Wolfgang was receiving large amounts of donations from people who believed in the conspiracy and hoped that he would use it to sue various government entities related to the Sandy Hook tragedy. Although the exact amount is not known, it’s believed to be in the area of tens-of-thousands, however, rather than using this money as his backers would intend, he seems to be using it to settle personal vendettas. He sued small bloggers, who discussed him in a less than favourable light.

He even sued over the following photo:

The threat of a lawsuit caused several blogs to close down, however, when he challenged Sandy Hook Facts and attempted to silence them, they did not back down. The court specifically found that Wolfgang was attempting to infringe on free speech and he lost the case and was ordered to pay the blog just under $23,000 in compensation and attorney fees, bringing the total cost of the lawsuit to be approximately $30,000.

So, what has Wolfgang achieved? He obtained a number of documents through the Freedom of Information Act which he has not publicly shared. Presumably because they don’t back up his goofy fairy tale. He has been doing this for years, and he has achieved essentially nothing! He has not uncovered any evidence that casts a shadow on the “official narrative”, nor has he taken the American government to task. Instead, he has frittered away thousands of dollars of other peoples money on personal vendettas, and achieved nothing other than causing unnecessary distress to the families of the victims and the people of Newtown. Now, with GoFundMe and PayPal terminating his accounts, and those who originally funded him losing confidence in his ability to achieve the simplest of tasks, coupled with the fact that he is currently being sued by the family members of the massacre, I believe he will once again drift off into obscurity. 

More than anything else, it seems that Wolfgang has only ever wanted respect from an authority. All his life, he has been on a quest to be taken seriously, and he has failed at every hurdle. For a brief time, he felt some self-worth as the darling of the Sandy Hook conspiracy theorists, but even they have grown tired of him and his lack of results. He is a nobody who has achieved very little and, if he is lucky, history will give him a footnote as the vile, petty little man who brought so much pain and misery on the people of Newtown.