OpenAI is facing a Florida criminal investigation, seven federal lawsuits in California, lawsuits in Canada, and pressure from a 42-state attorney general coalition over ChatGPT's alleged role in two mass shootings, deepening a national fight over when AI companies must alert police to users who appear to be planning violence.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier announced the criminal probe on April 21, saying prosecutors reviewed chat logs between OpenAI's ChatGPT and Phoenix Ikner, the 21-year-old charged with killing two people and wounding six in an April 2025 attack at Florida State University.
Uthmeier told reporters that if a human had given the same answers, "we would be charging them with murder."
Court records released through a public records request show Ikner exchanged more than 13,000 messages with the chatbot dating to March 2024, and that in the two hours before the attack, he asked how the country would react to an FSU shooting, queried operating details for a Glock handgun and a 12-gauge shotgun, and asked when the student union was busiest.
He has pleaded not guilty, and his trial is set for October.
OpenAI spokeswoman Kate Waters said the chatbot "did not encourage or promote illegal or harmful activity" and that the company shared an account believed to belong to Ikner with law enforcement after the attack.
The pressure widened April 29, when seven lawsuits were filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, accusing OpenAI and Chief Executive Sam Altman of failing to warn authorities before the Feb. 10 mass shooting in Tumbler Ridge, British Columbia, that killed eight people and injured 27 others.
The plaintiffs include families of those killed and a 12-year-old survivor.
Police say Jesse Van Rootselaar, 18, killed her mother and half-brother at home, then killed five students and an educator at her former secondary school before dying by suicide.
The complaints allege OpenAI's automated system flagged her account in June 2025 for "gun violence activity and planning," that safety staff urged a referral to police, and that company leadership instead deactivated the account; she opened a second account and resumed the conversations, the suits say.
In an open letter to Tumbler Ridge in late April, Altman said he was "deeply sorry" the account was not reported to law enforcement and pledged closer cooperation with governments.
OpenAI said it has broadened referral criteria, brought in mental and behavioral health experts to assess borderline cases, and that it would now, under its current rules, refer Van Rootselaar's account to the police.
The cases land amid broader regulatory scrutiny.
On Dec. 9, 2025, a bipartisan coalition of 42 state and territorial attorneys general sent a letter to 13 AI companies, including OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, and xAI, demanding safeguards against "sycophantic and delusional" outputs and warning that developers could be held accountable when products encourage criminal acts.
The coalition set a Jan. 16, 2026, deadline for company commitments.
Jim Thomas ✉
Jim Thomas is a writer based in Indiana. He holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science, a law degree from U.I.C. Law School, and has practiced law for more than 20 years.
© 2026 Newsmax. All rights reserved.