{"id":260586,"date":"2026-05-06T13:22:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-06T13:22:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/260586\/"},"modified":"2026-05-06T13:22:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T13:22:12","slug":"fsu-lcso-face-negligence-lawsuits-one-year-after-mass-shooting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/260586\/","title":{"rendered":"FSU, LCSO face negligence lawsuits one year after mass shooting"},"content":{"rendered":"

Florida State University, the Leon County Sheriff\u2019s Office and AI firm ChatGPT are just some of the agencies and entities facing negligence lawsuits over the April 17, 2025, mass shooting<\/a> on the school’s campus that killed two people and injured five.<\/p>\n

FSU, which recently marked the one-year anniversary of the tragedy,\u00a0quietly settled one negligence claim from the shooting last year and has been named in at least two other notices of possible litigation.<\/p>\n

The exact number is unclear because\u00a0FSU\u00a0refuses to release any documents or information pertaining to negligence claims and settlements \u2013 a position experts say runs contrary to Florida\u2019s Sunshine Law and shrouds an important part of the tragedy in secrecy.<\/p>\n

The university cited the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, enacted to protect the educational records of students, when it denied public records requests from the Tallahassee Democrat.<\/p>\n

The Democrat learned about the claims against\u00a0FSU\u00a0after obtaining notices of intent to sue the Leon County Sheriff\u2019s Office.\u00a0LCSO, which provided the notices in response to a records request, is connected to the shooting because one of its deputies is the stepmother of the alleged shooter<\/a>, and her former service weapon was used in the attack.<\/p>\n

Robert Morales<\/a>, 57, a former Tallahassee restaurateur who served as dining coordinator at\u00a0FSU, was killed in the shooting.\u00a0Tiru\u00a0Chabba<\/a>, 45, an executive with\u00a0FSU\u00a0vendor\u00a0Aramark\u00a0from Greenville, South Carolina, also was killed.<\/p>\n

Chabba\u2019s\u00a0family<\/a> is represented by national civil rights lawyer\u00a0Bakari\u00a0Sellers and attorney Jim Bannister, who both practice in South Carolina, and\u00a0Boca\u00a0Raton\u00a0lawyer J. Robert Bell III. No lawsuit has been filed, however, and a spokesman for the lawyers declined to say whether one is coming.<\/p>\n

An attorney for Reese\u00a0Gourley<\/a>, an\u00a0FSU\u00a0student who was shot in the back, gave notice in letters dated June 12 of negligence claims against\u00a0FSU, the Sheriff\u2019s Office, Tallahassee State College and Deputy Jessica\u00a0Ikner, who changed her last name after the shooting. The notices say her client intends to sue for money damages.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have not yet filed any lawsuits,\u201d said Carrie\u00a0Roane, a partner at\u00a0Fasig\u00a0| Brooks in Tallahassee. \u201cOver the past year, we have been carefully evaluating all of the evidence as it has been developing and we are patiently and thoroughly examining all potential avenues of appropriate legal recourse which could best serve our client.\u201d<\/p>\n

Under Florida’s sovereign immunity<\/a> laws, people with claims against state and local governments must give formal notice of their intent to sue at least 180 days before filing a lawsuit.<\/p>\n

\"Evacuees<\/p>\n

Evacuees on FSU campus after a mass shooting occurred Thursday.<\/p>\n

The Florida Tort Claims Act also caps civil damages from such actions at $200,000 for any one person and $300,000 per incident. To collect more, the Florida Legislature must OK a special ‘claim bill<\/a>.’ Legislation passed this year<\/a> and awaiting Gov. Ron DeSantis’ review raises those caps to $350,000 per person and $500,000 per incident.<\/p>\n

The alleged gunman, Phoenix\u00a0Ikner<\/a>, a 21-year-old who was enrolled at FSU at the time of the shooting, is scheduled to go on trial in October on murder and attempted murder charges. He was shot in the face by an\u00a0FSU\u00a0police officer only three minutes after the gunfire began.<\/p>\n

Lawyer for one victim evaluating ‘safeguards’ that could have been used to ‘prevent senseless acts of violence’<\/p>\n

Ikner, who earned an AA degree at\u00a0TSC, was part of\u00a0LCSO\u2019s\u00a0extended family before the shooting and served on its Youth Advisory Council while in high school.<\/p>\n

He was fascinated with Hitler and Nazi Germany and expressed\u00a0neo-Nazi\u00a0views<\/a> when he attended\u00a0TSC, students previously told the Democrat. However, a Leon County grand jury<\/a> found that he \u201cwanted to kill as many people as possible\u201d and didn\u2019t target any group or person in particular.<\/p>\n

In her claims letters to\u00a0FSU,\u00a0LCSO\u00a0and\u00a0TSC,\u00a0Roane\u00a0wrote that her client sustained \u201cserious injuries\u201d as a result of the campus shooter. Gourley told media outlets after the shooting that she played dead to save herself.<\/p>\n

\u201cConcerns about this individual were previously raised while he was a student at Tallahassee Community College,\u201d the school’s former name, she wrote. \u201cHe also received firearm training from the Leon County Sheriff\u2019s Office<\/a>, and obtained the unsecured weapon used during the shooting from his stepmother.\u201d<\/p>\n

Roane\u00a0told the Democrat that\u00a0Gourley\u00a0is \u201cimmensely grateful\u201d for the \u201cincredible response\u201d to the shooting by\u00a0FSU\u00a0police, the Tallahassee Police Department,\u00a0LCSO\u00a0and medical personnel.<\/p>\n

\u201cHowever, we are evaluating various safeguards which could have been utilized, and will hopefully be utilized in the future, to prevent senseless acts of violence on a university campus,\u201d she said in a text.<\/p>\n

Roane\u00a0also noted\u00a0Ikner\u2019s\u00a0recently revealed use of ChatGPT<\/a>, in which he asked an AI\u00a0chatbot\u00a0about weapons and ammunition and how many people would need to die for a mass shooter to make national news.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe that, based on the disturbing conversations we have seen between\u00a0Ikner\u00a0and ChatGPT, that ChatGPT\/OpenAI\u00a0could and should have had appropriate barriers in place to prevent that type of information exchange and the violence that can, and did, result.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hobbs, Betty Morales\u2019 lawyer, said in April that he and his law partner Dean\u00a0LeBoeuf\u00a0are preparing a lawsuit against ChatGPT and its parent company, alleging\u00a0Ikner\u00a0was in \u201cconstant communication\u201d with the AI\u00a0chatbot\u00a0before the mass shooting. In April, Attorney General James Uthmeier announced a criminal probe into Open AI<\/a> and ChatGPT over its links to the shooting and other crimes.<\/p>\n

Morales\u2019 lawyers also obtained a $305,000 out-of-court settlement from from the company that provides homeowner insurance on the house where Ikner lived with his father and stepmother.<\/p>\n

‘People in the community have a right to know,’ open government expert says<\/p>\n

Judd\u00a0Rosen, a Miami attorney representing one of the victims in the mass shooting, notified the Leon County Sheriff\u2019s Office of their intent to sue in a May 19 letter. The victim, whose name was redacted, suffered \u201cserious injuries\u201d in the shooting.<\/p>\n

The claims letter lists involved governmental entities as\u00a0FSU,\u00a0FSU\u00a0Police,\u00a0FSU\u00a0Campus Access & Security, the Sheriff\u2019s Office and Leon County government.<\/p>\n

In a 14-page letter,\u00a0Rosen\u00a0asked that all evidence pertaining to the shooting be preserved, including all safety and security policies, all staff or faculty safety training records, including those pertaining to active shooters and information pertaining to previous assaults or shooting that occurred at\u00a0FSU.<\/p>\n

Rosen\u00a0did not return a phone call from the Democrat.<\/p>\n

The Democrat filed public records requests with\u00a0FSU\u00a0in March and April asking for copies of any claims, complaints, settlements or general releases stemming from the mass shooting. In response, the university provided one seven-page document that was completely redacted but nothing else.<\/p>\n

FSU\u00a0said any records responsive to the requests were confidential and exempt from disclosure under\u00a0FERPA\u00a0and a related state statute. The university said in response to a request for settlements that it couldn\u2019t provide records \u201cwithout a\u00a0FERPA\u00a0release,\u201d or student authorization.<\/p>\n

The Democrat then asked the university to provide information about claims and settlements without revealing the identities of any students.\u00a0FSU\u00a0declined.<\/p>\n

\u201cOut of respect for the victims and their families, we have no further comment on this matter,\u201d Amy Farnum-Patronis, senior director in the Office of University Communications, wrote in an April 20 email.<\/p>\n

Barbara Petersen, CEO and publisher of the Florida Center for Government Accountability and a Sunshine Law expert, said\u00a0FSU\u00a0could redact any exempt information while still providing records and basic details of any\u00a0litigation stemming from the shooting. She added that the university\u00a0can\u2019t \u201chide behind a tragedy\u201d to avoid its statutory and constitutional obligations to provide access to public records.<\/p>\n

\u201cKnowing the number of claims, knowing the amounts of the settlements reached is not disrespecting anyone, dead or alive,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s information that is important to the community. This was a tragedy that affected the entire community, and people in the community have a right to know how the university is dealing with this and what they\u2019re doing about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Contact Jeff Burlew at jburlew@tallahassee.com or 850-599-2180.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FSU, LCSO face negligence claims one year after mass shooting<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Florida State University, the Leon County Sheriff\u2019s Office and AI firm ChatGPT are just some of the agencies…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260587,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[28,1422,5156,1289,21152,112642,83315,100043,232,234,233,13581],"class_list":["post-260586","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tallahassee","tag-florida","tag-florida-state-university","tag-lcso","tag-leon-county","tag-mass-shooting","tag-negligence-claim","tag-negligence-claims","tag-robert-morales","tag-tallahassee","tag-tallahassee-headlines","tag-tallahassee-news","tag-tallahassee-state-college"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260586","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260586"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260586\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260586"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260586"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260586"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}