OpenAI faces new lawsuits linked to Tumbler Ridge mass shooting

SAN FRANCISCO - OpenAI was hit with multiple lawsuits claiming the artificial intelligence company could have prevented a mass shooting in Canada earlier in 2026 by informing law enforcement about the suspected killer’s messages with the popular chatbot ChatGPT.

The complaints were filed on Sept 2 in federal court in California by teachers, students and a principal who were present during the February massacre at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in British Columbia.

They alleged OpenAI knew that Jesse Van Rootselaar, the chief suspect, was planning the attack due to her use of ChatGPT, but made a “conscious decision” not to warn the authorities. 

“This is not someone typing into Google ‘Where can I buy a gun?’” said Jay Edelson, an attorney for the plaintiffs in the cases. “This is technology where the chatbot is helping plan murders.”

The lawsuits aren’t the first against OpenAI tied to the shooting. In April, seven cases were filed by other family members and victims, including the mother of a girl killed in the shooting and a 12-year-old student who was shot. Those cases are ongoing.  

Jason Kwon, OpenAI’s Chief Strategy Officer, said in a statement on Sept 2 that it’s “completely untrue to say that the people at the center of these challenging decisions do not prioritise safety.”

“There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about what happened at Tumbler Ridge, or the victims of this devastating tragedy and their families,” Kwon said in a statement. “It’s a constant and sobering reminder of the important and incredibly difficult work that many people in my team do each and every day.”

Chief Executive Officer Sam Altman, who is a defendant in the lawsuits, wrote a public letter to the Tumbler Ridge community apologising for failing to report the suspect’s account to law enforcement. 

OpenAI and other chatbot makers have faced a stream of litigation since 2024 related to its users committing crimes or alleging that extensive use of the technology has inflicted a range of harms on children and adults alike.

In some cases, the chatbots have been accused of fostering delusions and despair for some and leading others to suicide and even murder-suicide.

In the Tumbler Ridge cases, the lawsuits claim OpenAI’s automated system flagged the account used by Van Rootselaar, 18, for “gun violence activity and attack planning” roughly eight months prior to the shooting.

An internal safety team at the company reviewed the issue and recommended referring the chat logs to law enforcement.

In June 2025, leaders at the company vetoed the recommendation and deactivated Van Rootselaar’s account, according to the complaints.

Despite the deactivation, she was able to register for a new account. The decision about whether to alert law enforcement was in the hands of OpenAI’s Chief Global Affairs Officer Chris Lehane, the suits claim.

Kwon defended Lehane, saying “it is absolutely false to say Chris Lehane was involved with our original referral decision, or that our investigators report to him in any way.” 

The suits allege the company prioritised its reputation over the safety threat posed by the conversations Van Rootselaar had with ChatGPT. 

“The risk of real-world deaths never factored into the calculation – or if it did, it was treated as an acceptable cost of protecting the corporate brand,” the lawsuits say.

On the day of the attack, Van Rootselaar allegedly shot and killed her mother and stepbrother at home and then went to the Tumbler Ridge campus and killed six other people, five of whom were children.

She was found dead after the shooting from what appeared to be a self-inflicted wound. BLOOMBERG