More cases against OpenAI over injuries arguably caused by ChatGPT use; and a comment on why recognizing such claims would be bad policy

 The number of claims against OpenAI related to injuries alleged to have been caused by the use of ChatGPT continues to rise.  For two stories on this I posted recently go here and here.  Here are the latest stories I have seen:

Family of FSU shooting victim sues OpenAI over suspect’s ChatGPT use (The Hill 5/11/26)

Parents accuse ChatGPT of assisting in son’s drug-induced death (ABA Journal 5/13/26)

For some commentary on these types of claims, you should take a look at this article:  "More Liability Will Make AI Chatbots Worse At Preventing Suicide" (TechDirt, 5/6/26)

Washington Court allows claim against Amazon based on plaintiffs' decedent's suicide -- UPDATED

February 22, 2026

 Long time readers of this blog may remember that I have posted a number of times about cases dealing with whether Amazon can (or should) be considered a "seller" for purposes of product liability law.  (Go here and scroll down.)

The most recent of those cases involved that claims of the families of three teenagers and a young adult who died after ingesting sodium nitrite purchased on Amazon. The trial judge denied a motion to dismiss the complaint but the Washington Court of Appeals reversed, finding that the plaintiffs could not support the element of duty because the decedents had intentionally misused the product.

I am writing about this today because earlier this week, the Washington Supreme Court unanimously reversed holding that the plaintiffs could continue to pursue their claim against Amazon.  You can read more about the case in Courthouse News Service, and you can read the decision of the court here.

In deciding the case, the court rejected the so-called "suicide rule" which is still in place in many jurisdictions and according to which the act of suicide is, as a matter of law, a superseding cause that defeats the cause of action.  The court's rejection of this rule follows a recent ruling in Nevada and what appears to be a new trend on the issue. Go here for more on that story.

UPDATE (3-12-26):  Courthouse News Service has a story on the case here.

Yet another lawsuit filed against ChatGPT for its alleged role in a user's suicide

 Since August of last year I have seen several cases filed in different jurisdictions against AI platforms alleging in one way or another that the platform contributed to a person's decision to commit suicide.  See here, and here.  I also reported on the fact that Nevada decided to abandon the so-called "suicide rule" which will make it less difficult to support a prima face case for injuries caused by suicide.  See here.

So, today I am reporting on yet another case filed against ChatGPT.  In this one, the mother of a man who killed himself after conversing with the chatbot is suing the generative artificial intelligence company OpenAI and its CEO and founder, Sam Altman. According to the article, the mother alleges that the AI platform coached her son into suicide, even while he told ChatGPT that he did not want to die.

You can read more about this case here.

Another lawsuit filed against makers of ChatGPT based on the AI platform's alleged role in a suicide

 I recently posted a comment on a case filed by the parents of a minor suing the makers of ChatGPT alleging that the AI platform helped their son commit suicide (see here).

Now comes news that a similar lawsuit has been filed in California.  In this one, in its capacity as executor to a deceased woman, a bank filed the claim against the maker of ChatGPT arguing that the platform was responsible for inducing a mentally unstable son to kill his elderly mother and then commit suicide.

Courthouse News Service has the full story here, and NPR has a brif audio commentary here.

Nevada Supreme Court abandons "suicide rule" and adopts proximate cause analysis for all suicide cases

 Long time readers of this blog may remember I have often posted about cases involving claims for wrongful death arising out of someone’s suicide.  (See here.)  These are always difficult cases, not only because of the underlying circumstances surrounding the death but also because, as you probably know, the prevailing approach to the issue is that suicide is a superseding cause as a matter of law.

Yet, I have noticed in recent years more courts are coming around to the view that this so-called “suicide rule” should be abandoned – a position I happen to agree with.  See my comments on cases from Tennessee, Arizona, Alabama and Illinois, for example.

So, today I am writing about this topic again, because the Supreme Court of Nevada just issued an opinion doing away with the suicide rule in a very well written opinion in a case called Bourne v. Valdes,  569 P.3d 971 (Nev. 2025).  As the court explained:

We conclude that a patient’s suicide does not preclude liability for medical malpractice as a matter of law.  Rather, like any other action alleging that a medical provider’s negligence caused injury or death to a patient, the ordinary principles of medical malpractice apply.  Consistent with existing Nevada medical malpractice law, a medical provider who is alleged to have provided negligent care to a patient owes a duty of care to that patient, regardless of whether the medical provider has control over, or custody of, the patient.  If the medical provider’s conduct is proven to fall below the standard of care, then “the crucial inquiry is whether the defendant’s negligent conduct led to or made it reasonably foreseeable that the deceased would commit suicide.” White v.  Lawrence, 975 S.W.2d 525, 530 (Tenn.  1998).  If the patient’s suicide is a foreseeable consequence of the medical provider’s negligence, then the medical provider may be held liable.  See Patricia C.  Kussmann, Annotation, Liability of Doctor, Psychiatrist, or Psychologist for Failure to Take Steps to Prevent Patient’s Suicide, 81 ALR 5th 167, § 4 (2000) . . .  However, where the patient’s suicide is not foreseeable, then the suicide is a superseding intervening cause, severing the causal chain and relieving the medical provider of liability for their negligence.  White, 975 S.W.2d at 530.  

I agree that this is the correct analysis that should be applied. Suicide is sometimes unforeseeable, but often it is foreseeable and plaintiffs should have the chance to prove it.  The notion that suicide should be considred to be unforeseeable as a matter of law is based on the notion that committing suicide goes so against human nature that it is inconceivable that someone would decide to do so.  The problem with this is that this view is not realistic.  Suicide is common.  In fact, it is one of the top leading causes of death among juveniles in the US.  And, if you take into account mental health issues, and known medication side effects, it is unrealistic to say that suicide is necessarily unforeseeable.  In many cases, it can fairly be argued (and proven) that it was totally foreseeable.

Parents sue ChatGPT Company alleging the AI program helped their son commit suicide

 The parents of a 16-year-old who died by suicide sued OpenAI last week, claiming that ChatGPT encouraged their son to take his life and even provided detailed instructions on how to do so.  

Above the Law has a good comment on the issues raised by the case here.  On the one hand, it points out that "[w]hile the complaint criticizes ChatGPT for answering Raine’s questions about the technical aspects of various suicide methods, these read like simple search queries that he could’ve found through non-AI research. They’re also questions that someone could easily ask because they’re writing a mystery novel, so it’s hard to make the case that OpenAI had an obligation to prevent the bot from providing these answers. The fact that ChatGPT explained how nooses work will get a lot of media attention, but it seems like a red herring because it’s hard to imagine imposing a duty on OpenAI to not answer technical questions."

On the other hand, it discusses how troubling the AI's conversations about the child's actual intent to take his own life.  You should read the comment to see the details.

Courthouse News Service has more on the story here.

This is an interesting case, and it is worth keeping an eye on, but the first obstacle the plaintiffs will have to deal with is the fact that the defendant will likely argue that they can't meet the element of proximate cause because suicide is usually considered to be a superseding cause.

California expands the notion of "present at the scene" and "a contemporaneous sensory observance" of an accident for purposes of a claim for emotional distress of a bystander

 You probably remember from law school the development of the law related to claims by bystanders for emotional distress at witnessing someone else suffer an injury.  It originated in California with the famous case of Dillon v. Legg in which a mother saw a car hit one of her daughters.  In that case, the mother was not within the so-called zone of danger and would not have recovered under the applicable doctrine at the time, but the court adopted a new approach to the question.  Under the new approach, a bystander outside the zone of danger could support a claim if she could show that she had a close personal relationship with the victim, that she had a contemporaneous sensory observance of the accident and that she was present at the scene of the accident.  

Since that case was decided, the new approach was slowly adopted by a small majority of jurisdictions and law professors like me have explored the different possible consequences of its application by creating hypos involving all sorts of complicated scenarios.  In one of my hypos, for example, I ask the students, what if the mother is watching a live TV broadcast of the Olympics when her daughter suffers an injury.

Some jurisdictions have also explored different variations of the scenario.  For example, some have decided cases explaining how this type of claim should be decided if the plaintiff is away from the scene of the accident and only hears about it from someone else who witnesses it, or if the plaintiff does not see the accident, but sees its aftermath, or if the plaintiff does not see the accident but hears it, and so on.

I am writing about this today because I just saw an article in the ABA Journal reporting that a new case in California has finally decided one of the typical law school hypos:  what if the plaintiff is not at the scene but has a contemporaneous sensory observance of it by "technology."  

In this new case, the court held that a mother who heard her daughter’s car crash while giving her directions by cellphone has a right to recover.  The case is called Downey v City of Riverside, and you can read it here.

In my opinion, the decision is not surprising.  Granted the plaintiff was not "present at the scene" as originally required by Dillon v Legg, but I always thought that the element of having a contemporaneous sensory observance would become more important if the technology involved could at least provide some support for a feeling of "presence" at the scene.  In the end, however, it seems that the trajectory of the doctrine is heading toward minimizing the need for presence at the scene as long as the element of a contemporaneous sensory observance is strong.

As always, it is interesting to see how the common law expands and contracts as time goes on and it will be interesting to see where the courts go from here.

Follow up on the possible criminal liability of a parent

 A few days ago I posted a comment on the ongoing prosecution of the mother of a child who engaged in a mass shooting at a school.  The case is a criminal prosecution but some of the issues are similar and relevant for tort law because they involve the possibility of imposing vicarious liability (which is not what is being charged) and the underlying issue of causation (which is very much at issue in the case).  

I am following up on this today because Joseph Margulies. a Professor of Government at Cornell University, recently published a comment on these issues over at Justicia. In it he points out, correctly, that one important issue in the case (as in a torts case) is the question of proximate cause and, although he does not mention it by name, the question of duty.  And, in the end, he questions whether it would be a good idea to impose a duty on parents that could result in criminal liability under the circumstances of the case.  The comment is short and you can read it here.  

News reports that a case in Michigan will decide if parents can be criminally responsible for a child's actions are wrong

 If you have been paying attention to the news, you may have heard that a criminal case is just underway in Michigan in which the mother of a child who killed a number students in a school shooting spree is on trial for involuntary manslaughter.  And, you may have noticed that an often repeated version of the story is that the case is about whether parents can be held responsible for the conduct of their child.

This formulation of the issue is wrong.  

The parents are not on trial for the conduct of their child.  That would mean that the state is looking to convict them based on vicarious liability.  Instead, the parents are on trial for their own conduct, which led to and resulted in the conduct of the child.  That's very different.  In other words, the parents are being tried for direct (as opposed to vicarious) liability.  They are not facing convictions "for the conduct of their child"; they are facing conviction for their own conduct.

Now, before we go any further, let's remember that this case is a criminal case, not a torts case.  But the implications of the possible liability of a parent for the results of the conduct of a child are obviously important for tort law.

In torts, parents are typically not held vicariously liable for the conduct of their children.  But they can be held liable for their own conduct if their conduct is a cause that leads to the injury of the plaintiff. Thus, the principle at issue is the same.  

However, making the case for tort liability is easier.  There seems to be pretty solid support for the arguments of all the elements of the cause of action, including proximate cause since it is relatively easy to argue that the injury was a foreseeable consequence of the negligent conduct, which included giving the child a gun knowing the child was mentally unstable.  Of course, the defendant will argue that the conduct of the child was a superseding cause, but the argument will come down to whether the child's conduct was unforeseeable, and there is good support to defeat that argument.

BUT back to the actual case in Michigan, what is different is that for criminal liability, the conduct in question must have been defined as a crime by the penal law.  And that is the issue in the criminal case.  The state is trying to extend the definition of manslaughter to include the conduct of the parents which allegedly "facilitated" the manslaughter committed by the child.  This creates the confusion.  Rather than charge the parents for the "facilitation" of the crime, or with a crime like "reckless endangerment" or aiding and abetting or something like that, the state is charging the parents with the actual manslaughter.  

Whether that is the proper charge given the evidence is a matter of criminal law about which I am not an expert.  But the issue was argued before the court.  The court held against the parents, and was affirmed by two higher courts on appeal.  Here is the decision of the Michigan Court of Appeals which holds that the lower court did not abuse its discretion in finding The district court did not abuse its discretion in determining that the child's decision to shoot four classmates was not a superseding cause because it was foreseeable.

Interestingly, take a look at the finding of the trial court on the issue, which if you did not know otherwise you would think was taken from a torts case (other than the reference to "as alleged by the People"):

The Court concludes that sufficient evidence has been presented to allow a reasonable juror to find factual causation and to allow a reasonable juror to conclude that the deaths of the victims were a direct and natural result of the Defendants’ gross negligence.  The Court further concludes that the criminal misconduct of the Defendants’ son was an intervening cause but that a reasonable juror could conclude that his actions were reasonably foreseeable.  Therefore, the causal link between Defendants’ actions and their liability for the deaths of the victims, as alleged by the People, is not severed by the actions of their son.  A reasonable juror could conclude that the action of the Defendants’ son was a related link in the causal chain. 

According to the news, the case is the first instance in which a parent is charged (for her own conduct) with the crime that corresponds to the conduct of the child.  Not too long ago, the mother of a 6-year-old who shot a teacher was tried in relation to the incident, but she was tried (and convicted) of child neglect, not with the crime that would correspond to the conduct of the child -- which is what the prosecutors are trying to do in Michigan.

The case is clearly an attempt to send a message and put pressure on parents to take better care or control of a child when there are signs that the child needs it.  This may start a trend in prosecutions and it may influence how courts deal with similar issues in torts cases. 

You can read coverage about the case here:

NPR (audio)

The Hill (includes video)

The Hill (includes video of the opening statements)

Comment on the recent case on whether a suicide is an unforeseeable intervening event

 A few days ago I reported (here) that the Illinois Appellate Court recently decided a case on whether a decedent’s conduct in committing suicide constitutes a superseding cause that defeats a plaintiff’s cause of action for wrongful death.  The case is called O’Donnell v. Bailey & Associates Counseling.  

I mentioned that I was interested in the subject because Illinois is one of those states that has decided in the past that a suicide is an unforeseeable, and therefore superseding, intervening cause “as a matter of law.”  I finally had a chance to read the opinion, and, oh my!  What a mess!

If you want a course on how to make something much more difficult and confusing than it needs to be read this case and, more importantly, the state supreme court's cases it cites.  By working through a word salad based on statements about “general rules” that apply “as a matter of law” but that end up having exceptions, which means they should not always apply a matter of law, and ignoring basic rules of tort law, in the end the court manages to decide the case by going against the language of precedent cases, while stating that it is following precedent, which is actually correct, because the precedent cases do not say what the court has been saying they said since they were decided.  

Did you get all that?  Let’s see if we can figure it out.  And let’s start at the very beginning.

As you probably know, the prevailing approach to the issue of proximate cause is the so-called scope of the risk analysis (adopted by the Restatement) the main ingredient of which is the notion of foreseeability.  According to this analysis, a defendant’s conduct is a proximate cause of the injury if the injury is a foreseeable consequence of the risk created by the negligent conduct.  But you also probably know that this long version of the analysis is usually shortened to simply asking whether the injury is foreseeable.  If the plaintiff can convince that the injury is foreseeable given the conduct of the defendant, the plaintiff will meet the element of proximate cause.

Now, the defendant, of course, can then argue that the injury is not foreseeable and one way to do that is to argue that an intervening event which was not foreseeable interrupted, and broke, the chain of causation.  Thus, if the defendant can convince that the intervening event was not foreseeable, the defendant will be able to say that the plaintiff can’t establish the element of proximate cause.

This is the basic tort law principle at issue in suicide cases.  In an attempt to defeat the plaintiff’s prima facie case, the defendant will always argue that the conduct of the decedent, ie, committing suicide, was unforeseeable.  

Now here is where things start to get complicated.  Usually, what is or is not foreseeable is a matter of fact to be decided by the jury, but a number of jurisdictions have held that a suicide is unforeseeable “as a matter of law.”  

This conclusion is based on the notion that committing suicide goes so against human nature that it is inconceivable that someone would decide to do so and therefore it should always be thought of as unforeseeable.  The problem with this is that this view is not realistic.  Suicide is common.  In fact, it is one of the top leading causes of death among juveniles in the US.  And, if you take into account mental health issues, and known medication side effects, it is unrealistic to say that suicide is necessarily unforeseeable.  In many cases, it can fairly be argued (and proven) that it was totally foreseeable.

Now let’s talk about the state of the law in Illinois.  

In Illinois, the Supreme Court decided long ago that a suicide is unforeseeable “as a matter of law.”  Yet, in 2015, it decided a case called Turcios v. DeBruler Co. in which, probably without realizing it, the court twisted the analysis into such a pretzel that it ended up exactly where it said it wouldn’t.  I wrote about this back when the case was decided and you can read my comment here, but let me repeat the basics.

In Turcios, the court reiterated its precedent position that a suicide is unforeseeable as a matter of law, but then referred to that position as “the general rule” and recognized the possibility that a plaintiff could support a claim if the plaintiff could “plead facts demonstrating that the suicide was foreseeable, i.e., that it was a likely result of the defendant’s conduct.”

Hmm.  Does that sound familiar?  If not, go up an re-read the paragraphs where I explain the basic tort law principle of proximate cause.  

What does this mean?  It means that in 2015, the court, for all practical purposes abandoned the position that a suicide is unforeseeable as a matter of law and changed its approach to asking whether the suicide is a foreseeable consequence of the risk created by the conduct of the defendant.  

And what is that if not simply saying what we know from Torts 101: that knowing the defendant will argue that the intervening event (the suicide) was unforeseeable, the plaintiff will have to argue and prove that the intervening event was foreseeable.  

Given this decision, it makes no sense to continue to say that a suicide is unforeseeable as a matter of law.  But the court keeps doing it; and tries to make sense of it by claiming that that is “the general rule” but that there are exceptions to the general rule.  That contradicts its decisions, and more importantly, its logic.  It makes no sense.

Enter the new case, decided just a few days ago, which makes everything even more confusing but oddly reaches the correct result.

In this case, the Appellate Court discusses the possibility of imposing liability on a medical professional for alleged negligent conduct toward an outpatient who later committed suicide.  The plaintiffs, as you would expect, argued that the defendant’s conduct resulted in the decedent’s death and the defendant argued that the act of committing suicide was an unforeseeable and, therefore, superseding cause.  

Following precedent, the lower court dismissed the claim holding that the suicide was unforeseeable as a matter of law.  But the Appellate Court then reversed, once again contradicting the supposed precedent - but which makes sense now that we understand that precedent was abandoned (only the Supreme Court did not really say so when it happened).

This result, on the one hand, adds to the confusion about the issue.  Yet, on the other hand, the good news is that the Appellate Court actually used the correct analysis and reached the correct result.  It found that a suicide is not necessarily unforeseeable as a matter of law and, refuting an argument by the defendant, that it does not matter whether the decedent was a patient or an outpatient.  

Citing approvingly a number of decisions from other jurisdictions, the court agreed with one of them in that “[i]f those who are caring for and treating mentally disturbed patients know of facts from which they could reasonably conclude that the patients would be likely to inflict harm on themselves in the absence of preventative measures, then those caretakers must use reasonable care under the circumstances to prevent such harm from occurring.” 

However, the full analysis should be much more simple than the explanation given by the court (and the Supreme Court’s precedent cases).  First, the plaintiff has the burden to show proximate cause, and if the defendant argues that an intervening event is superseding, the court must determine whether that intervening event is foreseeable.  And, second, if the alleged intervening event is a suicide, it must be determined if that unfortunate event was foreseeable under the circumstances, which is not a question decided “as a matter of law.”

Now we sit and wait to see if the case will be appealed to the Illinois Supreme Court.  If it is, let’s hope the Court admits that the state of the law is a mess and takes the chance to clean it up.  Given the mess they have created up to this point, I am not too hopeful, but we’ll see.  It is a new year and maybe good things will come.

IL Appellate Court Holds that Mental Health Providers Can Be Liable for the Suicide of Outpatient Mental Health Clients

 The TortsProf Blog recently reported that the Illinois Appellate Court decided a case holding that a mental health professional can be liable for the suicide of an outpatient.  This is an interesting development because Illinois has decided in the past suicide is an unforeseeable intervening (and therefore superseding) cause as a matter of law.  I am interested in reading how the court distinguishes this case from those precedents.  The case is called O’Donnell v. Bailey & Assocs. Counseling, and you can search for it with this cite:  2023 IL App (1st) 221736.

Teacher can sue school district system for injuries suffered when a 6 year old, first grade, student shot her

In an important, and somewhat surprising, decision, a state judge has ruled that a teacher who was shot by a 6-year-old student in Virginia can proceed with a $40 million lawsuit against a school system over claims of negligence by school administrators.  

The issue in the case was whether the claim should be considered to be a claim for a work related injury. If so, the claim could only be brought as a workers’ compensation claim which would have provided much lower compensation for the plaintiff.

Given the ruling, the plaintiff can proceed with the torts claim she filed in court, which asked for $40 million in damages. 

The judge based its decision on the conclusion that the plaintiff's injuries “did not arise out of her employment” and therefore did not “fall within the exclusive provisions of workers’ compensation coverage.”  The judge also concluded that “[t]he danger of being shot by a student is not one that is peculiar or unique to the job of a first-grade teacher.”

You can read more about the story Courthouse Network News, NPR and The Hill.

As the case moves forward now, I expect it will raise issues related to intervening causes, proximate cause, and governmental immunity.  Stay tuned!

Idaho joins the modern trend that requires proof of "the case within the case" in legal malpractice cases based on alleged negligence in litigation

 I have to confess that I assumed that, as part of the analysis of cause in fact, all states required a plaintiff in a legal malpractice cased based on alleged negligence in handling the litigation of case to argue that they would have won "the case within the case" (or, in other words, that they would have won the underlying case had it not been for the negligent conduct of the defendant lawyer).  But it turns out that until recently, Idaho apparently did not require this.  Now they do.

Last week, the Legal Profession Blog reported that the Idaho Supreme Court decided a case in which it rejected a standard that the suing plaintiff only had to show "some chance of success" in the underlying medical malpractice case.  In doing so, the Court adopted the much more popular test of requiring the plaintiff to show that they would have won the underlying case (had it not been for the negligent conduct of the defendant lawyer).  This analysis is usually referred to as the "case within the case" analysis because it requires the plaintiff to show that they would have won the underlying (old) case in order to be able to win the new case they are litigating.  (Note that the court apparently says that showing the case within the case is needed to meet the element of proximate cause, although it is more accurate to say it relates to cause in fact.)

Meeting the case within the case standard makes it more difficult for the plaintiff to support their claim but it is the logical analysis that is consistent with the notion of cause in fact.  And, like I said, I always thought it was "universally" accepted, but now I see I was wrong about that.  

So I wonder if there are any other states that still recognize a cause of action without requiring that the plaintiff meet the "case within the case" approach.  Do you know of any?  

The case is called Rich v. Hepworth Holzer and you can read the opinion here.

Snapchat Ends 'Speed Filter' That Critics Say Encouraged Reckless Driving

 Last month I reported that the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had issued an opinion holding that the parents of a teenager killed in a traffic accident could sue Snapchat based on the argument that Snapchat's speed filter entices young people to drive at astounding speeds.

Today I am writing about this because NPR is reporting that Snapchat is eliminating a feature known as the "speed filter" that lets users capture how fast they are moving and share it with friends. 

You can read the story on NPR here.

Trial related to destroyed frozen embryos raises interesting questions -- UPDATED again

This story is updated below, at the end of the original post

I just read a story on Courthouse News on a trial in which the plaintiffs are suing the manufacturer of cryogenic tanks that somehow failed causing the destruction of thousands of frozen eggs and embryos, which according to the plaintiffs dashed some families’ only hope of having biological children.

The plaintiffs' claim is for product liability based on the alleged defective design of the tanks.  The defendant, however, is apparently going to argue that the tank's failure was due to the misuse of the product by the Fertility Center which used it.  This is the first interesting point in the case because that argument is essentially claiming that the conduct of the Fertility Clinic was an unforeseeable intervening (and therefore superseding) cause.  

Yet, the most interesting question raised by this case relates to the injuries claimed by the plaintiffs.  The story states that the claims "for the loss of eggs and embryos" were sent to private arbitration.

So, my first question is what is a claim for the "loss of" the eggs and embryos?   I am assuming "embryos" refers to fertilized eggs, while eggs are not fertilized.  If that is the case, there can be no claim for wrongful death for the loss of the eggs in any jurisdiction I know of.  And for the loss of the embryos, there can be a wrongful death claim only in jurisdictions that recognize that life begins at conception for purposes of the wrongful death act.  So I wonder if the claim is not for wrongful death but for something else?  Is it just a contracts dispute then?  I just don' know.

On the other hand, maybe the claim is for emotional distress, but that claim would depend on the jurisdiction's approach to those claims?  If the jurisdiction requires impact, I don't think there is support for the claim, for example.  Also, the facts don't seem to fit a claim for emotional distress of a bystander.  

Since the case is already at trial, I guess these questions were resolved already through motions to dismiss, etc.  But I wonder what the answers are.  

UPDATE May 30, 2021:  Courthouse News is following the trial closely.  This week they published the following stories:

On May 26:  Lab Workers Were ‘Devastated’ by Tank Failure That Destroyed Human Embryos

On May 27:  Tank Manufacturer Accuses Fertility Clinic of Falsifying Data in Frozen Eggs Trial 

June 6: Fertility Patients Describe Sadness and Anger After Freezer Tank Failure

June 9: Jurors Asked to Award $30 Million for Lost Eggs and Embryos

June 10: Jury Finds Tank Maker Responsible for Lost Eggs and Embryos, Awards $15 Million

June 12: Loss of Embryos and Eggs at Fertility Clinic Leads to Groundbreaking Multi-Million Dollar Verdict in California

June 20: $15 Million Verdict Against IVF Cryopreservation Tank Maker Is Big News

Parents of teen who committed suicide sue Snapchat and other "apps" developers

A few days ago I posted a news story about a decision against Snapchat.  Yesterday, I posted a story about a new decision involving a suicide.  Tragically, today's story combines both themes.

Law & Crime is reporting that the mother of a teenager who took his own life after months of online harassment is suing Snapchat and the makers of third-party anonymous messaging apps YOLO and LMK, alleging that the products violated consumer protection laws by failing to comply with their own terms of service that promise safeguards against cyberbullying.

You can read more on the story and the complaint itself here.

Court in Alabama holds suicide is not a superseding cause

In many other jurisdictions, a decedent's conduct in committing suicide is considered a superseding cause, presumably based on the notion that it is always unforeseeable that someone would commit suicide. 

But we all know that this statement is simply not true.  Depending on the circumstances, whether someone might commit suicide is as foreseeable as any other intervening event.  And, for that reason, it is not convincing to hold as a matter of law that suicide is always unforeseeable.  Yet, that is what many courts do.

I am writing about this today because I just read in Courthouse News that an appeals court in Alabama recently ruled that a man accused of sexually assaulting a college student who later killed herself can be sued for wrongful death, finding that suicide arising from an alleged sexual assault does not “absolve the alleged assailant of liability.”

The case is Rondini v. Bunn and you can read the decision here.

Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit recognizes cause of action against Snapchat

A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals recently decided that the parents of a teenager killed in a traffic accident can sue Snapchat based on the argument that Snapchat's speed filter entices young people to drive at astounding speeds.

The decedent and two other teenagers were driving at over 120 miles an hour and wanted to capture the experience using an app feature called "speed filter" which documents real-life speed.  After one of them opened and started using the app, the driver lost control of the car and hit a tree.  All three died in the crash.

This type of allegation is not new.  It was the same type of allegation used in cases involving people playing "Pokemon Go" (remember that craze?). I posted a podcast on those claims back in 2016 here.

Other cases have found against the sender of a text which distracts a driver.  For example, see here, and here.

So, the plaintiffs' argument that the app "entices" young people to do stupid or dangerous things is not new; but it is not an easy one.  First of all, there is the issue of whether the conduct of one of the kids should be considered a superseding intervening cause.  Was the goal of the joy ride to use the app?  Or did they decide to use it after they were already driving fast?

Also, and even more problematic for the plaintiffs is the issue of comparative negligence, or assumption of the risk (if the jurisdiction still recognizes it as a defense).  If the jurisdiction is a modified comparative negligence jurisdiction, the defendants will argue that the plaintiffs' negligence should defeat the cause of action. 

What is most interesting about this case is that the plaintiffs argued the case as a products liability case while the defendant tried to defend the case by arguing it is protected from liability by the Communications Decency Act.

According to Courthouse News, the Ninth Circuit’s rejection of the defendant's attempt to hide behind the Communications Decency Act is the second opinion by an appellate court.  The other one was the Georgia Court of Appeals which rejected virtually identical arguments made by Snap in another Speed Filter case.  NPR has more on the case here.

The case is called Lemmon v. Snap, Inc, and you can read the opinion here.

Federal court rules that parents of a third grader who committed suicide have a cause of action against school board and school principal

 In a case that has a number of interesting implications the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has affirmed the denial of a motion to dismiss in a case involving the suicide of a young boy due to bullying in school.

The case involves a third grader who committed suicide after allegedly being the victim of multiple bullying incidents over a couple of years.  According to the complaint, school officials either downplayed the severity of incidents or flat out refused to notify them. Also, despite surveillance footage of the most recent incident, the school's principal and vice principal misrepresented the nature of Taye’s injuries to the boys parents.  

The parents sued the school board, and the principal and vice principal in their personal capacities.  The defendants filed a motion to dismiss which was denied by the lower court, and the Court of Appeals affirmed.

The case is interesting for a number of reasons.  First, there is the question of whether state immunity should protect the defendants.  

Second, there is the question of proximate cause.  Most often courts find that suicide is an unforeseeable intervening cause that severs the chain of causation preventing plaintiffs from supporting proximate cause.  However, in this case the court found that the boy’s suicide was plainly foreseeable, especially considering the school’s guidelines on bullying include suicide as a risk.

As I am sure you remember the prevailing test for proximate cause is to ask whether the injury is a foreseeable consequence of the risk created by the negligent conduct.  If the school guidelines actually mention suicide as a risk, it will be very difficult for the defendants to say that it was an unforeseeable consequence.

The case is called Myers v. Cincinnati Board of Education and you can find a copy here.

For more information on the case you can read stories in Law & Crime, and Courthouse News.

Torts and time travel

Ever wonder how the notion of time travel, and the concepts of proximate cause and the (no) duty to help relate to each other?  Here is the answer.