On Feb. 5, attorneys for the Nasca family of Bayport entered a filing with the Eastern District court of New York in response to a motion made by defendant, ByteDance, Ltd. (“TikTok”), in December, that asked for the dismissal of their 2023 wrongful death lawsuit on behalf of their son Chase, who died by suicide in February 2022.

With the uncertainty of TikTok operations in the United States following President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January, the lawsuit was unaffected by the removal and quick reinstatement of the application. National Security Adviser Michael Waltz has been tasked with aiding the brokerage of a sale of the app to an American entity.

The original lawsuit named the Long Island Rail Road and the Town of Islip as defendants, but a Suffolk County judge dismissed all three from the lawsuit, where they were accused of not fencing off an area where Chase entered alongside the LIRR tracks and was subsequently killed.

The motion filed by TikTok’s attorneys in December asserts that the First Amendment negates the claim made by the Nasca family. Specifically, defendants are citing Section 230, which absolves liability for third-party content, thus unable to be legally responsible for suicidal actions.

In March 2023, the Nasca family spoke at Congress to address the concerns of parents and the popular social media app.

In court documents, the Nasca family’s attorney stated that TikTok’s COO and CEO made statements that the app was “welcoming” and “sunny.”

The Nasca family alleges that “to further transfix minors, [TikTok] created an algorithm that presents young users with psychologically disturbing videos because such videos produce a greater dopamine response in children as opposed to safe, benign content.”

Chase was described in court documents as a “smart, athletic, social child who never demonstrated outward symptoms of depression.”

The Nascas said they did not consent to their son’s download of the social media app, but believed it only contained “silly dance videos.”

The court documents allege that Chase sought “uplifting content,” but the TikTok algorithm instead showed suicide-themed content, including some videos that urged young people to kill themselves by stepping in front of a moving train.