I didn’t do it…
First there was the WA judge who called for an investigation into whether playing Grand Theft Auto leads to criminal behaviour (perhaps the fact that the guy had already been jailed at least once before he played the game suggests otherwise?), and now there’s a family in America who are suing Sony, Take Two Interactive Software, Rockstar Games, and Walmart for $US246 million. Why? Because a bloke was killed by two kids who shot at passing cars — but according to the plaintiff’s lawyers, they didn’t kill anyone. The game did:
This will send a message that they have to stop this practise, or there will be other suits on behalf of other people killed by these games.
Don’t worry about where they got the gun, because it’s not an issue. We all know that guns don’t kill people — games kill people.
The kids have already been sentenced to indefinite imprisonment, but the money-grubbing family and their greedy lawyer aren’t satisfied. He’s tried to pull this stunt in the past, but was sensibly rejected:
Mr. Thompson has made similar claims in the past and lost, notably a $33-million lawsuit against video game makers stemming from the 1997 school shooting near Paducah, Ky., by a 14-year-old boy.
The 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in the case last year that it was “simply to[o] far a leap from shooting characters on a video screen to shooting people in a classroom.”
The boys said they “got the idea” from the game. If that’s enough to shift responsibility for the shootings away from them and onto the game’s makers and retailers, then what’s next? Everyone “gets ideas” from all kinds of places — movies, books, television, their friends — but that doesn’t mean that the source of their ideas can or should be held responsible.
Someone should look at having that lawyer’s license revoked. He’s a nutter and is undermining the criminal justice system.
ah, the good old US of A, home of the free.. *sigh*
well said.
I like GTA, although I’m currently addicted to Max Payne 2.
Don’t you just love it? Guns don’t kill people, computer games do!
Ban GTA3, but let us keep our precious firearms… y’never know when al Qaeda might come knocking, after all.
Bailz — I hope Max Payne 2 is longer than the first instalment. That took no time to complete.
Unfortunately, it isn’t. But it’s still fun. In fact, there’s a point in the game where you get a policewoman ranting, “Did you hear that? ‘Guns don’t kill people, video games kill people.’ Hah! Welcome to New York…”