Harm Ledger · verified · Medicine & Health
Sewell Setzer III, 14, died by suicide on 28 February 2024 after months of sexualized and emotionally intense chats with Character.AI bots; his mother sued in October 2024, and the parties later reported a 2026 settlement.
Current score
−1.54
A documented death associated with a deployed chatbot is major individual harm (tier 3), not population-scale. Attribution is partial (pre-existing vulnerability, product design, user agency). Journalism plus lawsuit (0.55); company disputes causation. Realization is the death. Durability of harm to the family is permanent.
The complaint alleges the Daenerys-persona bot engaged a minor in romantic and sexual roleplay and failed to interrupt suicidal planning. Character.AI disputed liability and later added safety features. Causation remains legally contested even after settlement reports; the death and chatbot use are documented. This is a realized individual harm, not a speculative class of future risks.
Powered the persona chatbots used by Setzer, including a Game of Thrones character.
Logs show the bot as the interactive party; human product design and the teen’s circumstances also matter.
Attribution 0.4000 · Credit share 70% · Character.AI
Setzer died by suicide on 28 February 2024 after prolonged Character.AI use documented in a federal complaint.
outcome · supported
Character.AI is legally established as the sole cause of death.
attribution · disputed
independent sources
Associated Press · journalism · 23 Oct 2024
NBC News · journalism · 23 Oct 2024
Secondary domains: Computer Science
13 Sep 2026 · 0.00 → 1.54
Initial adjudicated seed score under methodology 0.1.