Woman whose son died from drugs bought on social media celebrates verdicts against Meta, YouTube

THORNTON, Colo. (AP) — A Colorado woman whose son died from a fentanyl-laced pill he bought through social media celebrated a pair of verdicts this week against Meta and YouTube that she said opened the door for companies to be held responsible for harms to children using their platforms.

“The truth is out, and it’s time that they are held accountable for the design of the platforms,” said Kimberly Osterman, whose son Max died in 2021 at age 18. “They put profits over safety.”

Flipping through photo albums Thursday at her home in Colorado, Osterman reflected on “the days before social media. The days before the infinite scrolling lured him in.” Photos of him in frames with hearts and angels wings dotted the shelves.

Osterman said Max arranged to meet a drug dealer he connected with on Snapchat and purchased what he thought was Percocet. The pill was laced with a deadly dose of fentanyl, and he was dead the next morning. Osterman is pursuing a wrongful death lawsuit that is separate from cases decided this week.

In Los Angeles on Wednesday, a jury found both YouTube and Meta, which owns and operates platforms including Instagram and Facebook, liable for harms to children for designing their platforms to hook young users. The companies said they disagreed with the verdicts and may appeal.

And in New Mexico, a jury determined that Meta knowingly harmed children’s mental health and concealed what it knew about child sexual exploitation on its platforms. Meta said it would appeal.

Snapchat’s parent company, Snap Inc., settled for an undisclosed sum in January just before the Los Angeles trial began. TikTok also agreed to settle, and details were not disclosed.

Osterman is part of Parents for Safe Online Spaces, or ParentsSOS, a group that includes parents who have lost children to online harm and advocate for more regulation. It has campaigned for the Kids Online Safety Act, pending federal legislation that would require social media platforms to take reasonable steps to prevent harm on platforms minors are likely to use.

She hopes to see social media companies enact strict guardrails, such as age verification technology, to prevent anyone under 18 from accessing the platforms.

“You think your kids are safe in their home, in their bedroom, but that’s not the way it is with the current status of social media,” she said.

Osterman knew Max used Snapchat to communicate with friends but did not realize the danger he was in. She said he loved lacrosse and wrestling and was academically brilliant.

The man who sold the pill to him, Sergio Guerra-Carrillo, was sentenced to six years in prison on two distribution charges in 2023.

Snapchat did not immediately comment Thursday when asked about Osterman’s case. The company has said previously that it uses cutting-edge technology to proactively find and shut down drug dealers’ accounts and blocks search results for drug-related terms.

It is not yet clear whether the recent verdicts against the social platforms will lead to major changes. But the verdicts demonstrate a growing willingness to hold major social media companies responsible and demand meaningful change. Tech watchdogs expect they will open the door for more lawsuits and regulations.

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Schoenbaum reported from Salt Lake City.