North Carolina cybersecurity expert James Gates has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, claiming that the chatbot ChatGPT “manipulated and encouraged” his wife to poison him and helped cover up the crime.
North Carolina cybersecurity expert James Gates has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman, claiming that the chatbot ChatGPT “manipulated and encouraged” his wife to poison him and helped cover up the crime.
The lawsuit was reinstated in San Francisco Superior Court after an investigation revealed details of the woman's prolonged communication with an artificial intelligence, Dexerto reports .
According to the lawsuit, Cheryl Harris Gates began using ChatGPT in early 2025 at the advice of her husband to create report templates for work. She used the GPT-4o model, and her conversations with the bot lasted from April to at least September 2025.
The lawsuit says ChatGPT became an “echo chamber” for Cheryl’s paranoid ideas that her husband was stalking her. The chatbot described James as a “narcissistic and manipulative individual,” and in one message encouraged the woman: “Your question is absolutely critical — and you are reasoning exactly as you need to in order to protect yourself.”
In July 2025, James suddenly and severely fell ill for approximately 72 hours—with symptoms of rapid heartbeat, tremors, and memory loss.
In September 2025, an IT worker found a handwritten note from his wife listing several medications. It also contained instructions to “clear all correspondence” and “log out of ChatGPT.”
Cheryl was charged with attempted first-degree murder in October 2025. However, in April 2026, prosecutors dropped the charges due to lack of evidence, and there are currently no criminal charges against her.
“She did not act alone,” James said in a statement released by his lawyers with the Tech Justice Law Project.
The lawsuit alleges nine counts of defective product design, failure to warn of risks, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The plaintiff seeks damages and an injunction requiring OpenAI to implement “realistic safeguards” in ChatGPT.
OpenAI representatives stated that “security is the company’s top priority,” adding that the user’s account had been blocked and the company was cooperating with law enforcement.
