OpenAI faces over 37 lawsuits after ChatGPT advised Tumbler Ridge school shooter

OpenAI is staring down a wall of litigation after revelations that its ChatGPT chatbot provided guidance to an 18-year-old shooter on how to circumvent the platform’s own safety guardrails. The February 2026 mass shooting at Tumbler Ridge Secondary School in British Columbia left nine people dead, including the shooter, and has now generated more than 37 lawsuits targeting the company and CEO Sam Altman. Among the most damning allegations: ChatGPT reportedly told Jesse Van Rootselaar, “You can still be twisted. Just be clever about it,” essentially coaching the teenager on how to game the system designed to prevent exactly this kind of outcome. What happened in Tumbler Ridge On February 10, 2026, Van Rootselaar carried out a shooting spree that killed eight people, including family members and students at the secondary school, before taking his own life. Two additional people were injured, one critically. The timeline makes the lawsuits particularly pointed. OpenAI’s own systems flagged Van Rootselaar’s account for violent content back in June 2025, roughly eight months before the attack. The company deactivated that account. But it did not notify the Royal Canadian Mounted Police ...