The Social Media Victims Law Center has announced it has filed two wrongful death lawsuits in connection with the deaths of two girls who died while participating in the “blackout challenge” on TikTok.
According to the center, the challenge “encourages users to choke themselves with belts, purse strings or other similar items until passing out.”
The lawsuits allege that Lalani Erika Walton, 8, of Temple, Texas, and Arriani Jaileen Arroyo of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 9, died of self-strangulation while attempting the challenge. Walton died July 15, 2021. Arroyo died in February of 2021.
This is not the first time the social media platform has been sued over the blackout challenge. In May, The Washington Post reported that Tawainna Anderson of Chester, Pa., filed a wrongful-death lawsuit against TikTok in the U.S. District Court in Eastern Pennsylvania. Anderson’s daughter, Nylah Anderson, 10, hanged herself in her mother’s closet with a clothes hanger and a purse.
The Social Media Victims Law Center said in a news release that the lawsuit, “alleges that TikTok’s dangerous algorithm intentionally and repeatedly pushed the deadly “‘Blackout Challenge’ into both Lalani and Arriani’s TikTok ‘For You Page’ incentivizing them to participate in the challenge that ultimately took their lives.”
Center founding attorney Matthew P. Bergman said, “TikTok needs to be held accountable for pushing deadly content to these two young girls. TikTok has invested billions of dollars to intentionally design products that push dangerous content that it knows are dangerous and can result in the deaths of its users.”
The Washington Post reported other children who allegedly died performing the blackout challenge after seeing it on TikTok, “including a 14-year-old Australian boy in April 2020, a 10-year-old Italian girl in January 2021, a 12-year-old Colorado boy in April of that year and a 12-year-old Oklahoma boy in July 2021, according to the lawsuit.”
In the Post’s May story, TikTok told the The Washington Post that the blackout challenge predates TikTok and has never been a TikTok trend.
TikTok has been sued over other challenges as well.
Two men in Wisconsin died after they were electrocuted performing fractal wood burning. Several deaths were attributed to a challenge that involved jumping in front of moving trucks.
In March of this year, Pa. Attorney General Josh Shapiro said his office is joining eight other states to investigate possible risks of TikTok to children and young adults.
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