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Comment by gunfighthacksaw | Hacker News Reader

Imagine a suicide hotline which played a prerecorded message saying “you’re useless, KYS” and so on.

Who or what would be liable for a death resulting from a suicidal person calling up and killing themselves?

Obviously someone is at fault, because we all instinctively realize that such a setup is monstrous and horrific. I hope.

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The person or organization that created the answering machine would be responsible.

Seems straightforward, right?

Operating this hotline sounds like a First Amendment protected activity, and laws banning this encouragement have been struck down as unconstitutional. However, providing specific instructions that could be construed as assistance can be a crime or make you an accomplice (suicide is often a crime) and patterns of harassment could also be prosecuted.

See e.g. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Francis_Melchert-Din... (law found unconstitutional in part, convicted of assisting)

Pretty sure operating something billed as a "suicide hotline" and then playing a message to every caller that says "kill yourself" would open you to significant criminal and civil liability in every court in the USA if anyone attempted suicide after calling your hotline.

While there are certainly free speech protections for discussing suicide, there is a pretty solid line between that and using something billed as a crisis resource to directly encourage suicide.

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