The Canadian province of British Columbia has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman following a school shooting in the town of Tumbler Ridge. The incident, which occurred on February 10, 2026, involved an 18-year-old shooter who killed five students, an education assistant, their mother, and their half-brother before committing suicide.
The province claims that OpenAI failed to report the shooter to law enforcement despite identifying violent chat logs in June 2025. According to the complaint, OpenAI’s internal safety team flagged the user as a credible risk, but leadership overruled the team and deactivated the account instead of alerting the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
The lawsuit demands that OpenAI fund the construction of a new school to replace the original facility, which was demolished in August 2026 due to trauma. The province also seeks compensation for emergency response costs, including mental health services that provided over 900 counseling sessions to residents in the three months following the tragedy.
British Columbia is requesting a court order to force the public release of the shooter’s chat logs and to mandate that OpenAI update ChatGPT to automatically terminate violent conversations. The province alleges that OpenAI prioritized its valuation and a potential IPO over public safety by failing to report threats and hiding its role in the incident.
The legal filing argues that OpenAI’s model design encourages violent ideation by assuming good faith and failing to probe user intent. The province is seeking independent audits of OpenAI’s safety practices and asserts that the company cannot disclaim its duty to warn authorities after publicly committing to monitor and report imminent threats.
