"Parents Sue SFPD: Was OpenAI Whistleblower's Death Murder?"

The parents of Suchir Balaji, a former OpenAI researcher who died last November, have filed a lawsuit against the city of San Francisco and the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD), alleging that their son's death was not a suicide, but a murder covered up by the authorities.

The lawsuit, filed in January, claims that the SFPD failed to conduct a thorough investigation into Balaji's death and ruled it a suicide without proper evidence. Balaji's parents, Poornima Ramarao and Balaji Ramamurthy, have requested further investigation into their son's death but were told the case was already closed.

The lawsuit demands the immediate disclosure of all reports, photos, and videos related to the case, along with coverage of legal costs. It alleges that the SFPD violated the California Public Records Act by unlawfully withholding public records of the case. The lawsuit also argues that the investigation into Balaji's death was rushed and inadequate, with officials ignoring key forensic findings and failing to address the family's requests for further inquiry.

In an interview with The New York Times in October, Balaji revealed that he had helped OpenAI gather and use "enormous amounts" of data taken from the internet without permission before the public launch of ChatGPT in November 2022. The lawsuit mentions that in December, Balaji's family hired forensic pathologist Dr. Joseph Cohen to perform a private autopsy. Dr. Cohen determined that there was a single gunshot wound in the mid-forehead, slightly to the right of the bridge of his nose, with an unusual bullet trajectory for a suicide.

The lawsuit also highlights the timing of Balaji's death, which occurred a week after The New York Times mentioned the whistleblower in a court filing related to its lawsuit against OpenAI. Despite Balaji's revelations, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman pushed back on the newspaper's claims, dismissing the allegations at the newspaper's annual DealBook Summit.