The murder-suicide case from August might be the first to involve an AI chatbot.
A new lawsuit accuses OpenAI of exacerbating a Connecticut man’s paranoia via ChatGPT, leading him to murder his mother.
On Thursday, the estate for the deceased mother sued OpenAI in San Francisco Superior Court, claiming the company should be held liable for product defects, negligence, and wrongful death, according to The .
“A man who was mentally unstable found ChatGPT, which rocketed his delusional thinking forward, sharpened it, and tragically, focused it on his own mother,” the complaint alleges.
Stein-Erik Soelberg, a 56-year-old former technology marketing director, died by suicide after beating his 83-year-old mother, Suzanne Adams, to death. In August, the Wall Street Journal reported that the case might be the “first documented murder involving a troubled person who had been engaging extensively with an AI chatbot.”
Soelberg’s posts on Instagram and YouTube made it apparent he used ChatGPT, which allegedly fueled his delusions, rather than pushing back, the lawsuit says.
“And when he feared surveillance or assassination plots, ChatGPT never challenged him. Instead, it affirmed that he was ‘100% being monitored and targeted’ and was ‘100% right to be alarmed'», the complaint claims.
