In a major legal victory for youth plaintiffs and their families, the Superior Court of California for the County of Los Angeles has denied motions for summary judgment filed by Meta (Facebook & Instagram), Snap (Snapchat), Google (YouTube), and ByteDance (TikTok) in three bellwether cases within the Judicial Council Coordinated Proceeding (JCCP 5255) concerning alleged harms caused by social media platforms. These rulings pave the way for the first jury trials in the United States to address whether social media platforms can be held responsible for causing addiction and mental health harms to young users through their conduct in designing and operating their platforms.
The Court’s rulings, issued by the Honorable Carolyn B. Kuhl, rejected the Defendants’ attempts to dismiss claims brought by Plaintiffs Moore, K.G.M., and R.K.C., who allege that design features of platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, YouTube, and TikTok contributed to severe mental health harms, including addiction, anxiety, depression, sleep disruption, eating disorders, and body dysmorphia.
The Court rejected broad immunity arguments under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act and the First Amendment, finding that plaintiffs presented evidence that platform design features—such as infinite scroll, autoplay, notifications, and reward systems—may have been a substantial factor in causing the alleged harms. The Court found that Plaintiffs presented evidence that certain design features on Defendants’ platforms “were capable of causing the type of mental harms allegedly suffered.” The only claim dismissed was the negligent failure to warn against YouTube in one case (R.K.C.), with all other claims moving forward.
Jury Will Decide Causation and Liability: The Court held that critical questions—including whether these design features caused addiction and whether platforms failed to adequately warn users and parents—are factual disputes for the jury to decide.
“These rulings affirm that tech companies must face accountability for the design choices they make—choices that can profoundly affect the mental health of young users,” said Plaintiffs Lead Counsel. “We are grateful that the Court recognized the importance of letting a jury decide whether these platforms caused harm to these Plaintiffs.”
Lead Counsel for the Plaintiffs in the JCCP is Mariana McConnell of Kiesel Law, Rachel Lanier of Lanier Law Firm, Rahul Ravipudi of Panish | Shea | Ravipudi LLP, and Joseph VanZandt of Beasley Allen.
Jury selection for the first trial is set to begin on January 27, 2026. In a prior order, Judge Carolyn Kuhl ruled that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Instagram head Adam Mosseri, and Snap CEO Evan Spiegel must testify at trial.