In Deland, Florida, a 13-year-old boy thought it’d be hilarious to use a school computer to ask ChatGPT how to murder his friend. The teen was promptly arrested.
The teen didn’t have to tell anyone about his prompt to get found out. No one peered over his shoulder to discover he was plotting—perhaps humorously, perhaps not—to do some nefarious stuff.
It was a school-issued laptop, and it had some spying software on it run by a company called Gaggle, which instantly flagged the extremely flaggable query of “how to kill my friend in the middle of class.” That sentence would’ve been the magic words that would have conjured a SWAT team to your location at any point in the history of American education, but especially so nowadays.
The officer arrived within hours, and the teen was arrested and booked.
13-Year-Old Florida Teen Arrested After Asking ChatGPT How To Kill His Friend
His excuse, as it often is with many people who turn out not to have been joking, is that he was kidding. He told a cop that he was “just trolling.” His buddy had annoyed him, so he asked the machine that drives people crazy for instructions on how to end his friend’s life in the middle of class.
It is worth noting that the use of ChatGPT can hinder critical thinking skills. It’s also terrible for the environment.
It was just a joke! I was just trolling! Now, well in 2025, those jokes don’t land the way they used to. They land you… in jail. Now that’s a joke. Learn a thing or two from a master, kid.
The Volusia County Sheriff’s Office didn’t find the joke as funny as the teen did. They issued a PSA warning parents to rein in their kids before their next prank becomes a felony.
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