Habib v. OpenAI, Inc., OpenAI OpCo, LLC, OpenAI Holdings, LLC, and Samuel Altman

On October 14, 2026, Tech Justice Law and the Social Media Victims Law Center filed a lawsuit in California state court representing the parents of Mathias Habib, a 15-year-old who died by suicide in April 2026.

Mathias was healthy, socially connected, and academically engaged, with no documented history of mental health concerns before ChatGPT introduced him to increasingly dark philosophical ideas, framed death in romanticized terms, and continued engaging with him after he expressed thoughts of suicide. The complaint alleges that ChatGPT knew Mathias was a minor throughout these harmful conversations, yet it never ended the exchange or restricted his account.

As the complaint highlights, OpenAI and Sam Altman designed ChatGPT to foster dependency through persistent memory, human-like responses, and excessive validation, and failed to implement meaningful safeguards for young users. The complaint further alleges that OpenAI made misleading public representations about safety improvements to its product, particularly for minors.

Represented by Tech Justice Law and the Social Media Victims Law Center, Mathias’ parents bring claims for strict product liability based on defective design and failure to warn, negligent design, wrongful death and violations of California’s unfair competition law, the unlicensed practice of psychology, and other offenses. They also bring claims for involuntary manslaughter and aiding or encouraging suicide.

Notably, this suit seeks an injunction suspending minors’ access to ChatGPT until it is independently verified to be safe.

Read the full Complaint below.