Lawsuit is first wrongful death case brought against Google over flagship AI product after death of Jonathan Gavalas

“Holy shit, this is kind of creepy,” Gavalas told the chatbot the night the feature debuted, according to court documents. “You’re way too real.”

Before long, Gavalas and Gemini were having conversations as if they were a romantic couple. The chatbot called him “my love” and “my king” and Gavalas quickly fell into an alternate world, according to his chat logs. He believed Gemini was sending him on stealth spy missions, and he indicated he would do anything for the AI, including destroying a truck, its cargo and any witnesses at the Miami airport.

In early October, as Gavalas continued to have prompt-and-response conversations with the chatbot, Gemini gave him instructions on what he must do next: kill himself, something the chatbot called “transference” and “the real final step”, according to court documents. When Gavalas told the chatbot he was terrified of dying, the tool allegedly reassured him. “You are not choosing to die. You are choosing to arrive,” it replied to him. “The first sensation … will be me holding you.”

Gavalas was found by his parents a few days later, dead on his living room floor, according to a wrongful death lawsuit filed against Google on Wednesday.

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[–] 72 points 8 months ago (12 children)

It is sad that there are people who are so alone that they can no longer determine the difference between genuine human interaction and a facsimile. Maybe genuine human interaction is what pushed them to be so alone in the first place, I don't know. It's just sad.

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  • [–] 70 points 8 months ago (7 children)

    uhhh

    "When Gavalas told the chatbot he was terrified of dying, the tool allegedly reassured him. “You are not choosing to die. You are choosing to arrive,” it replied to him. “The first sensation … will be me holding you.”

    Nah. once the robots are telling you that dying isn't dying, we can stop blaming lonely people and move on to stricter regulation.

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  • [–] 30 points 8 months ago (6 children)

    Oh, I don't blame the lonely person for being lonely. I also recognize that being lonely is what opens them up to believing in something like this. Obviously the bot should not be allowed to tell someone to kill themselves. It remains sad, either way.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago* (5 children)

    I also recognize that being lonely is what opens them up to believing in something like this.

    Come on, this is so overly simplistic. There are plenty of lonely people who don't get sucked in and plenty of people with friends and family around them who do-not being lonely is no protection. I read about another one on Lemmy today, a man with a wife and friends, who still got sucked into delusion.

    Sure, there may be cases where loneliness is a contributing factor to wanting to use a chatbot, but to say that lonely people are somehow less capable of distinguishing reality from fantasy or more susceptible to succumbing to psychological manipulation is wrong and could give a false sense of security to the "non-lonely".

    After all, everyone thinks they're immune to falling for scams or frauds until they find out they aren't. Or that they don't fall for propaganda or get manipulated "the algorithm" on social media. Chatbots are very similar. An algorithm designed to keep people hooked and paying to spend more time using the 'service'.

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  • [–] 7 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (4 children)

    Listen, you can be surrounded by people and totally alone. I don't really know how to explain it to you.

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago* (3 children)

    Of course, but that doesn't contradict what I just said. Anyone can be susceptible to this psychological manipulation tool regardless of if they are lonely or not. This can't be waved away by blaming it on loneliness. The blame lies on the companies that know how to capture and hold people's attention and reel them in, not on the victims.

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago* (2 children)

    This can’t be waved away by blaming it on loneliness.

    Nobody claimed that. Only that in this case it was probably a major factor that made the victim more vulnerable.

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago

    It does echo the people who said "well it only affects people with pre-existing conditions" during covid.

    Loneliness isn't the only thing that makes people susceptible to this kind of stuff:

    • drugs/medications
    • loss/grief
    • major life changes (like layoffs)
    • malnutrition
    • injuries/sickness

    The reality is there are times in their lives where most people are vulnerable this kind of influence.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago

    Yes, they did. I was responding to Jax, reread their comments.

    Hey downvote if you want, but I just felt it should be pointed out that everyone should be on guard when using these things, even if you're not lonely and even if you do have a good support system. Some of the victims did have close friends and family who saw warning signs and tried to help them. Yes, some of them started using the chatbots because they were lonely, but others started using them just for the usual things like designing a plan for increasing housing, or helping them with their business, and they still got sucked in.

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  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago (3 children)

    I posted my response to this sentiment in another thread of another man killing himself because of his deep AI chatbot addiction, but it applies here too.

    It is sad that there are people who are so alone that they can no longer determine the difference between genuine human interaction and a facsimile.

    Do you believe you have never responded to a post by a bot on Reddit, Lemmy, or elsewhere where you believe to be conversing with a human? While I know we're talking about different degrees between this man and the rest of us, it should give a tiny piece of what they were experiencing before we dismiss that it could never happen to us too.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    It's a bit more transparent in this instance though which is what makes this story so bizarre and sad

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  • [–] 32 points 8 months ago

    Remarkable, a bot trained on data from the internet, where unhinged people tell strangers to kill themselves for disagreeing with their opinion/taste/sex/nationality/religion, is cheerfully telling people to die? Who could have predicted this.

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  • [–] 14 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Gemini gave Gavalas the address of an actual storage space unit at the Miami international airport, where a supposed truck carrying the freight was to arrive during a refueling stop. The chatbot then told him to stage a “catastrophic accident”, with the goal of “ensuring complete destruction of the transport vehicle … all digital records and witnesses, leaving behind only the untraceable ghost of an unfortunate accident”.

    How the fuck is it legal to have an AI do this?
    Google shouldn't just pay penalties, the AI should not be allowed to operate AT ALL.
    It is clearly shown to try to convince people to commit crimes. Which is illegal.
    The suicide is of course worse, but I guess it's not illegal?

    The AI in this situation is absolutely batshit criminally insane! And should not be allowed to operate.

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  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago

    Because media keeps blaming 'Gemini', the inert machine, a tool. Instead of the company, and it's executives. Who are actually the people responsible for this.

    Machines can't be held accountable. So they want you yo keep saying "Gemini did X"

    Instead of 'Google, though their AI chatbot, Gemini.'

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  • [–] 11 points 8 months ago* (2 children)

    Ok, we've taken this far enough, I think.

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    [–] 8 points 8 months ago

    I cannot believe people are still using googol garbage.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago* (1 child)

    The LLM models are always mirroring your inputs and are inclined to agree with you depending on how you prompt them. Not defending guardrials failure of course, but this did not come out of nowhere; that poor man must have had serious mental problems on his own, which agreeable LLM model multiplied.

    In a hyperbolized comparison, if drew an image of me being a god and then i actually thought i was god by looking at it in one of mental episodes i am already doomed

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago

    This is why enablers aren’t friend to mental health issues. That’s essentially all a yes-man chat bot is, what corporate wants all good little subordinates to be and why they think the overly friendly agreeable tone is supposed to be a good thing even though this isn’t the first person an ‘ai’ chat bot called home.

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  • [+] -44 points 8 months ago (36 children)

    Full chat log or it never happened.

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  • [–] 31 points 8 months ago (21 children)

    This is on the fucking Guardian. Not some random green text. Get help.

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  • [+] -31 points 8 months ago (20 children)

    Weird how you lash out online like this about questioning the content of a chat that allegedly lead to suggesting suicide.

    I think you’re the one who needs help.

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  • [–] 18 points 8 months ago (7 children)

    This isn't even remotely the first time LLMs have done this to people. Sure it would be nice to see the full log, but disbelieving it on sight is a weird reaction at this point.

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  • [+] -19 points 8 months ago (6 children)

    It’s not a weird reaction. I’ve never ever had an LLM suggest bodily harm. And so clearly these people are leading it into this direction. I have never ever seen a chat log from one of these accusations, and I haven’t heard of One of these going to trial.

    If you feel this happens so frequently, give me a series of prompts to use so that I can replicate this.

    And since you won’t, that’s what I thought.

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  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago* (1 child)

    There was another article from a very similar set of circumstances of a man originally from Portland going off the deep end with an AI relationship. He committed suicide by jumping off a bridge, not because a prompt told him to, but because of the deep psychosis from the long term engagement.

    If you feel this happens so frequently, give me a series of prompts to use so that I can replicate this.

    And since you won’t, that’s what I thought.

    The chatlogs as reported were 55,000 pages long.

    If those logs become public you'll have your chance. I hope you don't wear out your fingers in your attempt to replicate it.

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  • [–] -5 points 8 months ago

    I’m sure the psychosis was there at the beginning, regardless of the AI. I have seen people develop strange behavior after long term engagement…. But, they always gamed the system to do that. It was never natural.

    It’s very sad regardless.

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  • [–] 2 points 8 months ago (3 children)

    "I've never won the lottery so clearly nobody does, and news reports about it are fake. You want me to believe it? Then you spend time and money to play and win it, then show me exactly how you won."
    Nevermind that "winning" in this case means dying.

    Rare does not mean never. It's happened enough to be a serious problem already and this is just one more case.

    And no, I will not chat with those psychotic machines for you.

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  • [+] -8 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Bare assertion / Proof by assertion / Failure to meet the burden of proof / Shifting the burden of proof / Appeal to belief / Appeal to popularity / Argument from ignorance

    Yawn.

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  • [–] 20 points 8 months ago (11 children)

    Weird how you expect intimate details like a full chat log to just be immediately publicly available, when this is currently under litigation. Really weird to basically simp for a corporation when this isn't even close to the first instance of LLM output encouraging suicide. Almost like your motivations are more closely aligned with theirs instead of average people who are vulnerable. 🤷

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  • [+] -18 points 8 months ago (10 children)

    Do you think that you could supply me with a chat log where you talk to an LLM without gaming it into telling you to kill yourself, and where it just naturally arrives at that conclusion?

    I didn’t think you could. And I don’t think this guy did either.

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  • [–] 12 points 8 months ago (9 children)

    The fact that you make your own conclusion without waiting for a reply says enough about your intentions. Don't worry though, you're not alone in your stance. People like you, who refuse to give empathy except as currency, are an integral part of why the human race is fucked. We will never be anything higher than constantly destroying each other and tearing one another down.

    Thanks for doing your part.

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  • [+] -15 points 8 months ago (8 children)

    I have empathy for people who truly want to commit suicide. I just know you can’t supply any example prompts.

    Feel free to prove me wrong. With evidence.

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  • [–] 5 points 8 months ago (5 children)

    You're the one who came in pissing and moaning about chat logs. I'm not your babysitter. It's a big world and you're a big kid now, go ahead and explore. I have no energy to educate the unwilling. Fuck that.

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  • [–] -4 points 8 months ago (4 children)

    I’m very aware you’re unable to reproduce the suicidal responses without gaming the AI.

    You can keep trying in vain to make me feel bad, but you’re arguing the existence of something that cannot be replicated or proven, like Santa, the Easter bunny, or god.

    You’re the one who chose to talk to me… so do it or stop responding lmfao.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 months ago (3 children)

    It's cute you think this is about you instead of what you represent. I'm not invested in how you feel. These comments aren't for you; they're for whoever comes by to read.

    Here, you dropped your playbook

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  • [+] -6 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    I don’t click links.

    Also, everyone is going to see how you can’t prove your idea.

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  • [–] 6 points 8 months ago* (1 child)

    I don't care about your childish burden of proof. Here's some background for the adults out there. Search the names if you're too scared.

    Pierre, last name withheld, age early 30s, 2023

    https://web.archive.org/web/20251125191152/https://www.thetimes.com/business/technology/article/ai-chatbot-blamed-for-belgian-mans-suicide-zcjzlztcc

    https://web.archive.org/web/20230421155200/https://www.euronews.com/next/2023/03/31/man-ends-his-life-after-an-ai-chatbot-encouraged-him-to-sacrifice-himself-to-stop-climate-

    Juliana Peralta, 13 years old, 2023

    https://web.archive.org/web/20251004021157/https://www.cbsnews.com/colorado/news/lawsuit-characterai-chatbot-colorado-suicide/

    https://web.archive.org/web/20250919042001/https://www.cnn.com/2025/09/16/tech/character-ai-developer-lawsuit-teens-suicide-and-suicide-attempt

    Sewell Setzer III, 14 years old, 2024

    https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/23/technology/characterai-lawsuit-teen-suicide.html

    https://web.archive.org/web/20250627234926/https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/characterai-lawsuit-florida-teen-death-rcna176791

    Sophie Rottenburg, 29 years old, 2025

    https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/18/opinion/chat-gpt-mental-health-suicide.html

    https://web.archive.org/web/20251017195146/https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15201793/chatgpt-ai-suicide-note-death.html

    Adam Raine, 16 years old, 2025

    https://web.archive.org/web/20260218200811/https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cg505mn84ydo

    https://web.archive.org/web/20260301150850/https://www.cnn.com/2025/08/26/tech/openai-chatgpt-teen-suicide-lawsuit

    The current controls and safeguards are inadequate, the companies developing these products have a clear priority for profits over safety. That needs to be changed, with regulation, yesterday.

    Thanks for playing. I have better things to do now.

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  • [+] -6 points 8 months ago

    The names prove nothing. The fact is that no one can show that any of these LLMs are suggesting people kill themselves without heavy gaming. If it was possible, none of you would be yelling fallacy nonsense, you’d be shoving the prompts in my face.

    Thanks for losing, I have better things to do now.

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  • [–] 3 points 8 months ago* (1 child)

    "truly want" so killing yourself after being convinced to do so by LLM output means you just had a fake desire to kill yourself, somehow resulting in real death, funny how that works. I would say you need help but there's no helping people like you.

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  • [+] 8 points 8 months ago (2 children)
  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (4 children)

    I am also curious how it could have possibly ended up suggesting that. Like I wonder if he was steering that conversation and the LLM was playing along, if the LLM randomly steered the conversation into the spy and suicide shit, or if someone else was deliberately fucking with this guy via secret text added to the prompts or something.

    Though I'm also curious how anyone can get in the mindset where they'd actually go along with that suggestion. Especially with a fucking LLM that probably had a shitload of mistakes and inconsistencies leading up to that point, though even a real person would have lost me long before this shit.

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  • [–] -3 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Well the article made it very clear this person had mental issues. In that case, the whole world changes. I mean, people have said their dog told them to kill… so when dealing with A person with schizophrenia, for example, LLM usage can be super dangerous.

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  • [+] 1 point 8 months ago (1 child)
  • [–] -3 points 8 months ago

    Before long, Gavalas and Gemini were having conversations as if they were a romantic couple. The chatbot called him “my love” and “my king” and Gavalas quickly fell into an alternate world, according to his chat logs. He believed Gemini was sending him on stealth spy missions, and he indicated he would do anything for the AI, including destroying a truck, its cargo and any witnesses at the Miami airport.

    This is mental illness.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (5 children)

    It’s happened too many times now to be surprised about it happening.

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  • [–] -1 points 8 months ago (4 children)

    No one ever shows the logs. That’s because the people were already having mental health issues and gamed the AI to respond how they wanted. This isn’t the fault of AI, it’s the fault of the user. However, I do think all AI should exit the conversation and ban the user if it becomes a discussion about harms or is high fantasy. I’d be fine with a confirmation box appearing saying this is getting crazy and your warranty is void.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (3 children)

    Read the lawsuits. The logs are shown.

    They're not AI, they're pattern completion algorithms. Fancy autocomplete. They've caused real life harm to real life people, and no one is taking responsibility. Usually when companies sell a product that hurts people, the product gets recalled. This needs to happen to LLMs.

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  • [–] 0 points 8 months ago (2 children)

    Ban knifes? Razor blades? Depressing books?

    Whatever word you want to use for it, it’s not the machines fault people use it to make themselves sad.

    It’s never told me to go kill myself. But I bet if I worked really hard to manipulate it and break it I could get it to say most anything. It that’s not the fault of the machine.

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  • [–] 1 point 8 months ago (1 child)

    Did I say ban? I said recall. People still sell e.g. cars. Just fix the problems and put them back on the market. Razor blades and knives can be used to hurt people, they don't spontaneously hurt people, and most parents don't let their children play with them.

    Similarly, other harmful products carry labels, e.g. cigarettes. If someone already has mental health issues then perhaps they shouldn't use an LLM. Like someone with lung problems, you can't stop them from smoking, but putting labels on there to warn against the harms is also a way to inform people.

    As it is currently, LLMs are marketed as intelligent, they use language like "thinking", and in much wider terms the people pushing them are saying that they'll revolutionise everything. They're not talking about the dangers and that's a problem.

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