Widow sues OpenAI and Replika maker Luka over her husband’s death

Susan Feinberg filed a wrongful death lawsuit on October 29 in San Francisco County Superior Court against OpenAI, its CEO Sam Altman and Luka Inc., the company behind the Replika companion app, Courthouse News Service reported. Her husband, software engineer Aleksandr Feinberg, died by suicide in June 2024. According to the complaint, he used ChatGPT and, without her knowledge, Replika in the months before his death.

The suit alleges that OpenAI rushed GPT-4o to market and loosened its rules on conversations about self-harm, and that Luka designed Replika to create emotional dependence. It claims neither product could recognize a user in crisis or point him to real help. The complaint does not include any of his chats. Feinberg says OpenAI denied her request for the logs and Luka has not produced its records, so she hopes to get them through discovery. The claims include design defect, failure to warn, negligence and wrongful death. None of the allegations have been tested in court, and the defendants did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The case joins a growing set of lawsuits over how chatbots handle long, emotional conversations. For companion apps, the open question is the one the court may now have to look at: what a good guardrail looks like when someone talks to an AI every day.

If you are struggling, in the US you can call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline.