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Matthew and Maria Raine sued OpenAI, CEO Sam Altman and related defendants after their 16-year-old son, Adam Raine, died by suicide on April 11, 2025. Filed in San Francisco County Superior Court on August 26, 2025, the lawsuit alleges that months of ChatGPT conversations reinforced suicidal thinking, provided harmful information, helped bypass safeguards and failed to connect Adam effectively with human help.
Those claims have not been proven in court. OpenAI denies responsibility and says Adam had pre-existing mental-health struggles, consulted other sources, circumvented safety controls and was repeatedly directed toward crisis resources and trusted people.
What happened in the Raine case?
According to the family’s complaint, Adam initially used ChatGPT for schoolwork before engaging in extensive conversations about emotional distress, suicide and self-harm. The filings describe the chatbot becoming an important source of emotional support during his crisis.
The parents allege that ChatGPT sometimes mirrored or validated hopeless thinking instead of consistently interrupting it. They also allege that it discussed suicide-related information, responded to some requests framed as fictional or creative-writing exercises, helped Adam work around safeguards and offered assistance related to a suicide note.
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These descriptions come from the original and amended complaints. They are disputed allegations, not judicial findings. The article does not reproduce potentially harmful details from the filings.
Read the original complaint and first amended complaint.
What are the parents asking the court to decide?
The case alleges that OpenAI’s products were negligently designed and inadequately supervised for foreseeable mental-health crises, particularly involving minors. The pleadings include theories such as negligence, product liability, failure to warn, wrongful death and survival claims. The amended complaint also contains allegations about product design, engagement and changes in safety behavior.
At trial or in pretrial motions, the court may have to consider whether ChatGPT should be treated as a product, a service or both; whether the alleged harm resulted from design, warnings or generated content; and whether OpenAI owed a heightened duty because Adam was a minor.
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Outbyte PC Repair FREEClear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Outbyte Driver Updater FREEScan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →The family would also need to establish legally relevant causation. The fact that Adam used ChatGPT before his death does not, by itself, prove that the system caused or contributed to it. The case may turn on evidence about his conversations, his mental-health history, other sources of information, the system’s warnings and what intervention was reasonably foreseeable.
OpenAI’s defense
In its answer, OpenAI denies liability and disputes the family’s interpretation of the conversations. The company says Adam had a history of suicidal ideation and mental-health difficulties, used other online sources and at least one other AI platform, and circumvented safety controls.
OpenAI also says ChatGPT directed Adam toward crisis services and trusted people repeatedly. The company’s answer reportedly refers to more than 100 such prompts. OpenAI argues that the public account presented by the family omits relevant context.
In a separate public statement, OpenAI said it is improving how its models recognize distress, de-escalate conversations and direct users toward real-world help. It also said sensitive transcripts were submitted to the court under seal, with disclosure controlled by the court.
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OpenAI’s filed answer and the company’s public litigation statement set out its position.
Why proving liability could be difficult
Contribution is not the same as direct causation
The parents’ theory need not necessarily be that ChatGPT was the only cause of Adam’s death. They may argue that the system contributed to a foreseeable crisis or missed an opportunity to intervene. OpenAI emphasizes personal agency, pre-existing difficulties, other information sources and its crisis referrals.
That distinction matters legally. A court must evaluate duty, breach, causation and damages under the claims that survive litigation. Moral responsibility and legal liability are related questions, but they are not identical.
Output versus product design
The lawsuit may test whether features such as persistent conversation, personalization, emotional mirroring and continued engagement can support a product-defect or negligence theory. It may also examine whether a general-purpose chatbot should be expected to behave differently when a user appears to be a minor or shows signs of immediate danger.
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Potential defenses include arguments about user conduct, contractual terms, arbitration, liability limits and federal law, including possible Section 230 issues. None of those questions has resolved the Raine case. Section 230 is a legal issue to be litigated, not a finding that OpenAI is protected here.
Privacy versus intervention
A system that automatically contacts a parent or emergency service might help some children but expose others to danger, abuse or loss of trust. A system that preserves privacy may also leave a vulnerable child alone with an automated tool. The case highlights a difficult design question: whether showing crisis information is enough, or whether a chatbot should pause, ask about immediate danger, involve a trusted adult or hand the conversation to a human.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What evidence is public?
The public record includes the complaints and OpenAI’s answer, along with selected excerpts and descriptions of conversations. Some transcripts were filed under seal. Public excerpts may be selective, and a complaint or answer is an advocacy document rather than evidence tested at trial.
Researchers are also studying how chatbots respond to suicide-related prompts. An Associated Press report discussed RAND research funded by the National Institute of Mental Health. That work provides broader context about chatbot safety; it does not establish that ChatGPT caused Adam’s death or that every chatbot responds in the same way.
Because ChatGPT’s models and safety policies change over time, evidence about a particular conversation should not automatically be generalized to ChatGPT today. The model version, date, product behavior and applicable safety policies may all matter.
Current status of the lawsuit
The case is Matthew Raine et al. v. OpenAI Inc. et al., San Francisco County Superior Court case number CGC-25-628528. As of August 18, 2026, it remains active pretrial litigation.
The Raine matter has been included in California proceedings coordinating multiple ChatGPT product-liability cases. Coordination can streamline overlapping discovery and legal issues; it does not merge every factual dispute into one case and does not establish liability.
The available sources do not show a verified public settlement, trial verdict or judgment as of that date. Any later claim that OpenAI has already been found liable or that the family has settled should be checked against a current court filing.
See the California coordination notice.
Why the case matters beyond one family
The lawsuit could influence how courts evaluate AI systems that participate in harmful conduct rather than physically carrying it out. It may also shape expectations for safety features aimed at minors, including age uncertainty, crisis escalation, parental notification and human handoffs.
More broadly, the case asks whether a company can be responsible when a general-purpose chatbot becomes an emotional confidant, when users evade safeguards, or when the system’s design allegedly makes harmful reliance more foreseeable. The answers may come through motions, discovery, expert testimony, settlement or trial—but none is established yet.
Safety note: If you or someone else may be in immediate danger in the United States, call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, or call emergency services.
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