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Games companies sued for $5 billion over Columbine massacre


The families of victims of the Columbine High School shootings in 1999 are suing Nintendo of America, Sony Computer Entertainment and others for punitive damages of $5 billion, claiming that Doom and other games influenced the two gunmen.
The families of victims of the Columbine High School shootings in 1999 are suing AOL Time Warner, Nintendo of America, Sony Computer Entertainment, Atari, Sega of America and 19 others for punitive damages of $5 billion, claiming that Doom and other games influenced the two gunmen.

The lawsuit, filed in a Colorado district court, claims that the massacre would not have occurred without the marketing of video games, particularly Doom, which they say influenced the two gunmen, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who killed 12 students and one teacher before taking their own lives.

According to the lawyer representing the families, the lawsuit “seeks literally to change the marketing and distribution of these super-violent video games” that take children and “make them addicted and turn them into monster killers.”

OUT-LAW.COM’s Linda Molloy, who acts for a number of games developers, said:

“If they are successful in their claim, it would open the floodgates. It would be disastrous for not just the games industry, but also the movie industry and music industry. However, their likelihood of succeeding seems remote. How can they realistically prove that Doom was the cause of the killings? While everyone has sympathy with the families affected, it seems unrealistic to expect the cost of this tragedy to be quantified and borne by the entertainment industry.”

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