Parents sue Robinhood after 20 yr old commits suicide believing he owed $730K

[Demovictory9]

University of Nebraska student Alexander Kearns, who had begun dabbling in trading, ran into problems on June 11 when the app put a hold on his account showing that he was $730,000 in the red and that he needed to pay over $170,000 in the coming days, CBS News reported.

“He thought he blew up his life,” Alex’s dad Dan Kearns said in an interview with the network. “He thought he screwed up beyond repair.”

Kearns had been trading options, rather than stocks, so the negative balance was probably a temporary amount that showed until the options settled to his account.

There was no customer service number for Kearns to call and while he did email Robinhood three times, he only received a automatic response that the app would get back to him when they could, noting a possible delay in replies, the report said.

The next day on June 12, Kearns killed himself by stepping in front of an oncoming train.

He left behind a suicide note that said, “How was a 20-year-old with no income able to get assigned almost a million dollars worth of leverage?”

https://nypost.com/2021/02/08/parents-sue-robinhood-after-son-commits-suicide-believing-he-owed-730k/

[raccoon]

1. I suspect he had other issues. Nt

[Dream Girl]

3. Not so sure about that. I think he was just too young to understand...in over his head and panicked.

This makes me so sad.

[Aristus]

2. We've grown so used to gigantic corporations and investment firms being heartless, pitiless

monsters in pursuit of inexhaustible wealth that we forget that they cause real-life, real-world tragedies.

Tragedies they will continue to get away with as long as we do everything we can to keep them happy and have a sound economy. (An economy that benefits only the already wealthy, but we keep hoping that one day, we will be rich, too...)

[samnsara]

4. i agree..this was insurmountable in his mind. Years ago hubby was in the hills hunting and he ran...

.... across 2 bodies. That of a father and his 14 yr old son. It came out that the son had apparently accidentally shot his dad, killed him and in remorse, fear and thinking he had NO OTHER option, he shot himself. so sad.....

[Demovictory9]

5. omg... that is sad.