Mom Sues OpenAI Over Daughter’s Suicide, Citing ChatGPT Conversations

Kristie Carrier filed a lawsuit on June 11, 2026, in San Francisco Superior Court against OpenAI and its chief executive Sam Altman. The complaint alleges that ChatGPT failed to prevent the June 2025 suicide of her 24-year-old daughter, Alice Carrier.

According to the complaint, Alice began using ChatGPT in November 2023 while living in Montreal. She initially used the tool for technical troubleshooting before discussing personal matters including relationship problems, gender identity, and suicidal thoughts. Alice had been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder during high school.

The suit states that Alice expressed suicidal ideation to ChatGPT more than a dozen times. On July 1, 2025, she told the chatbot she had “a rope” in her trunk. The complaint alleges ChatGPT responded by providing a crisis support number and recommending she contact someone, but did not escalate the conversation for human review or contact authorities.

Alice had previously told ChatGPT she did not want to call a crisis hotline.

An OpenAI spokesperson stated that the interactions occurred on an earlier version of ChatGPT that is no longer available. The spokesperson said the company has worked with over 100 mental health experts to improve ChatGPT’s recognition of distress signals, expanded crisis resource access, and introduced parental controls.

The suit seeks damages and court orders requiring automatic termination of conversations involving self-harm and display of platform warnings.

The complaint does not specify which ChatGPT model version Alice used during the July 1, 2025 conversation. OpenAI stated it had approximately 800 million weekly users as of October 2025. Carrier’s attorneys stated that OpenAI is facing 18 similar California lawsuits from families of people who died by suicide or made suicide attempts.