## Facts

- Nineteen-year-old John Daniel McCollum died by suicide on October 26, 1984, from a self-inflicted gunshot while listening to Ozzy Osbourne recordings through headphones.
- McCollum had a history of alcohol abuse and serious emotional problems.
- Earlier that evening, he listened to multiple Osbourne songs, including “Suicide Solution.”
- McCollum’s family alleged the recordings’ lyrics encouraged or incited suicide and proximately caused his death.
- The family sued Osbourne and music-company defendants (including CBS entities) asserting negligence, strict products liability, and intentional misconduct based on distributing music alleged to foreseeably cause self-harm.
- The trial court sustained defendants’ general demurrers without leave to amend on First Amendment grounds and later denied leave to file a proposed second amended complaint; dismissal was entered.
- The family appealed, challenging both the demurrer ruling and the denial of leave to amend.

## Issues

1. Whether song lyrics allegedly encouraging suicide can constitute unprotected incitement (or other unprotected speech) sufficient to avoid the First Amendment bar to tort liability.
2. Whether the pleadings stated viable claims for intentional tort, negligence, or strict products liability based on distributing recordings whose expressive content allegedly contributed to a listener’s suicide.
3. Whether the trial court abused its discretion by denying leave to amend where the proposed amendments emphasized an incitement theory and additional allegations about the lyrics.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeal affirmed the dismissal.
- The court held the lyrics and recordings were protected expression and the pleadings did not allege incitement to imminent unlawful action or any other unprotected category of speech.
- The court held the complaint failed independently to plead facts establishing intent, duty, or foreseeability adequate to support intentional-tort or negligence liability.
- The court rejected strict products liability premised on allegedly harmful expressive content.
- The court held denial of leave to amend was proper because amendment would be futile in light of the constitutional and pleading defects.

## Legal Principles

- Recorded music and lyrics are protected speech under the First Amendment.
- Unprotected incitement requires advocacy directed to producing imminent unlawful action and likelihood of producing such action; abstract or ambiguous artistic expression does not satisfy this standard.
- Tort liability generally cannot be imposed based on an individual listener’s atypical reaction to protected expression absent a recognized exception removing the speech from constitutional protection.
- Intentional tort claims require plausible allegations of specific intent to cause the harmful result; generalized allegations about marketing provocative content are insufficient.
- Negligence liability requires a cognizable duty and reasonable foreseeability; distributing expressive works, without more, does not create a duty to prevent self-harm by listeners.
- Strict products liability does not treat a work’s expressive content as a “defect” actionable in tort where the claim targets the ideas or messages conveyed.

## Conclusion

The court refused to impose tort liability on a musician and distributors for a listener’s suicide allegedly influenced by song lyrics, holding the claims were barred by the First Amendment and otherwise insufficiently pleaded, and that further amendment would not cure those defects.


McCollum v. CBS, Inc., 202 Cal. App. 3d 989, 249 Cal. Rptr. 187 (Ct. App. 1988)