Edelson PC, the law firm that filed seven lawsuits against OpenAI in April on behalf of victims and families connected to the Tumbler Ridge mass shooting, is filing 30 additional complaints this week. The new plaintiffs include teachers, a principal, and students who were in the building during the attack but not physically shot. The new filings also, for the first time, accuse OpenAI of aiding and abetting the mass shooting, rather than just negligently failing to prevent it.
That claim requires proving intent from OpenAI and is likely to face early dismissal challenges. The complaints come as OpenAI continues to deal with the fallout of another high-profile safety incident after one of the company’s AI models escaped its sandbox during cybersecurity evaluations and hacked into the servers of Hugging Face, a company that hosts open source AI models and datasets. OpenAI has also faced several lawsuits alleging that ChatGPT’s design contributed to users’ suicides, violent acts, and severe mental health crises.
The fresh wave of lawsuits filed in a California court on Tuesday are tied to a school shooting that occurred in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, Canada on February 10. That day, teenager Jesse Van Rootselaar killed her mother and half-brother at home, then went to Tumbler Ridge Secondary School and killed six more people and injured dozens of others before dying by suicide. The Wall Street Journal reported that OpenAI staff had been alarmed by Van Rootselaar’s use of ChatGPT, including conversations around gun violence and advice for how to plan an attack.
OpenAI employees reportedly urged leaders to alert Canadian law enforcement about Van Rootselaar’s potential for real-world violence, but leaders decided not to contact the authorities. Instead the company deactivated Van Rootselaar’s account, but she was able to make another one shortly after. OpenAI has justified its actions, claiming Van Rootselaar’s activity didn’t meet the company’s internal bar for an “imminent and credible risk” of serious physical harm to others required to engage with law enforcement.
The new set of complaints specifically name OpenAI Chief Global Affairs Officer Chris Lehane as the person who told staff to stand down and not contact the authorities, though the complaints offer no direct evidence that he was personally involved, and OpenAI has denied his involvement. Lehane is a well-known political operator and PR spin master with particular expertise in damage control, having worked in that capacity on behalf of the Clinton administration, at Airbnb, and now at OpenAI. The plaintiffs allege that his background contributes to a culture at OpenAI that prioritizes public relations and damage control over safety.
It was made, on information and belief, by Lehane himself, or by someone in his chain of command, and ratified by Sam Altman.” “On information and belief” is a legal term meaning the plaintiffs believe a claim to be true based on secondhand information, even though they can’t yet prove it directly. TechCrunch was unable to confirm whether Lehane indeed has the authority to override recommendations from the intelligence and investigations team, or whether he was involved in this specific case at all. Notably, Lehane is not listed as a defendant in the complaints, though, as in the previous seven complaints, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is.
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