Judas Priest: The Lawsuit Over Better By You, Better Than Me That Shook The Metal World
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 11 сен 2024
- Judas Priest: The story behind the infamous lawsuit over subliminal messages.
SIGN UP for 10 of the Craziest Stories in Rock N' Roll [Secret Playlist]: bit.ly/3vVPAEF
Check out our Top 25 Favourite Albums Here
rockandrolltru...
Have a video request or a topic you'd like to see us cover? Fill out our google form!
bit.ly/3stnXlN
----CONNECT ON SOCIAL----
Instagram: / rocknrolltruestories
Facebook: / rnrtruestories
Twitter: / rocktruestories
Blog: www.rockandrolltruestories.com
#judaspriest #robhalford #lawsuit
I cite my sources and they may differ than other people's accounts, so I don't guarantee the actual accuracy of my videos.
n 1969 English rock band Spooky Truth would release a song called "Better by You, Better than Me" The song would appear on Judas Priest’s 1978 album Stained Class. Then 7 years later on December 23, 1985, two young men an 18 year old named Raymond Belknap and 20-year-old James Vance who hailed from Sparks, Nevada spent the night drinking and smoking pot and listening to Judas priest before madeking a pact to take their own lives. The pair of men went to a nearby playground at a church and attempted to take their own lives with a shotgun. Belknap would die instantly while the Vance would survivebut only live for another 3 years before passing away..The LA Times reported his passing in 1988 claiming he was admitted to a hospital for depression before slipping into a coma and passing away. The paper claimed that a drug overdose may have resulted in him lapsing into a coma. It was also revealed that vance left behind a one year old daughter.
The families of the victims turned their anger towards Judas Priest and their label CBS Records. They blamed both parties for their son’s deaths alleging that the band hid submliminal messages on their cover of better by you, better than me which could be found if the track was played backwards. Amongst these submliminal messages they alleged to be included on the recording were ‘do it’ and ‘let’s be dead’ The lawsuit was spurred after the lone survivor James Vance wrote a letter to Belknap’s motherwhich read and i quote “ I believe that alcohol and heavy-metal music such as Judas Priest led us to be mesmerised,” A civil lawsuit would be filed in 1986, one year after the incident, but wouldn’t go to trial until 1990 in the pair’s home state of nevada. The families sought a minimu mof $3.6Million in damages to cover,\ medical bills and support for Vance’s daughter.
It was two years prior that Ozzy Osbourne had been involved in a similar case over the lyrics of one of his songs which allegedly drove a fan to take his own life. But unlike the Osbourne lawsuit which was thrown out of court because Ozzy’s lyrics were protected under free speech. The same couldn’t be said for Judas Priest. Technically, subliminal messages aren’t considered speach therefore they don’t have the same protection. The case involving Judas Priest became more about whether there were subliminal messages, whether they were discernible to the average listener and whether they could influence someone’s thinking. It may surprise you to know that the complainants originally took the band to court over another song called ‘Heroes End’ from the same album. Jayne ANdrews who served as a member of the band’s management team would reveal that the complainants took issue with the lyrics on the song with Andrews recalling: “They tried to say the band were saying you could only be a hero if you killed yourself, till I had to give them the correct lyrics which is ‘why do heroes have to die?’ Then they changed their plea to subliminal messages on the album.”
Guitarist Glenn Tipton would tell Loudersound “It’s a fact that if you play speech backwards, some of it will seem to make sense. So I asked permission to go into a studio and find some perfectly innocent phonetic flukes. The lawyers didn’t want to do it, but I insisted. We bought a copy of the Stained Class album in a local record shop, went into the studio, recorded it to tape, turned it over and played it backwards. Right away we found ‘Hey ma, my chair’s broken’ and ‘Give me a peppermint’ and ‘Help me keep a job’.”
The lawyers for Judas Priest and the label contended that the band had no known subliminal messages on the record and questioned the character of the two young men pointing to their troubled upbringing as being responsible for their deaths. The LA Times even wrote a profile during the trial on the mothers of the two men and it was less than flattering.
The article would state that Belknap’s Mother had been previously married four times and that her son was the subject of abuse from her fourth husband going on to write
“Belknap showed no interest in school, and like Vance, dropped out in the 10th grade. Working a series of construction jobs, he acquired a sawed-off shotgun, a pell
That lawyer comparing metal to smoking was priceless…
Was it the same lawyer that asked the band to sign a few of their albums for her as her kids were huge Judas Priest fans?
HA!
The Swedish Death Metal group Dismember also found themselves in a very similar situation two years later when they were dragged into a UK court to face obscenity charges for the track "Skin Her Alive" on their 1991 LP Like An Ever Flowing Stream".
Why, when Judas Priest says “Do it”, it can only mean suicide. Yet at the same time Nike’s slogan “Just Do It” was motivational and inspiring. 🤔
rustybones99
A whole Cult commited suicide . . . And ALL had their Nikes on ... ,, Do It ,, ruclips.net/video/oXmgU_aY-NI/видео.html
😮😮
I remember seeing a TV documentary about this case a while back, and one of the members of JP - I forget who now - said the idea that you would put messages on your album to kill off your fans. If anything, you'd put a message on telling them to buy more records. Not verbatim, but something very much like that, and that statement was oh so correct. I've remembered it ever since.
@@VauxhallViva1975 Rob Halford said that. It was along the lines of “buy 10 more copies of the record”
' Yet at the same time Nike’s slogan “Just Do It” was motivational and inspiring.' Well, the members of the Heaven's Gate cult all wore matching Nikes when they committed mass suicide, so....
I remember this being on the news when I was 9. It just made me want to listen to Judas Priest.
I remember reading an article about it in Rolling Stone when the trial was ongoing in 1990. I was just getting into metal and was aware of Judas Priest. It just made me want to hear their stuff other than "Breakin' The Law" and "You've Got Another Thing Comin'". Check out the documentary about it, "Dream Deceivers". It's an excellent film and now an absolute time capsule into the early 1990s pre-Nirvana rock culture.
No such thing as "BAD" publicity!
Me too actually though I didn’t know it was them till years later
I know. It's really stupid. It's like the "Parental Advisory" stickers they put on CD's warning of explicit lyrics. That just makes teenagers buy the CD even more, sometimes they don't even know of the band, but cos your parents don't want you listening to it, gotta buy THAT CD..... Ultimately, it was and still is a complete waste of effort, and only increases sales and awareness of CD's that certain parents don't want their kids listening to. They would have been better off just remaining silent about it, but they draw all this attention to it and make it worse! People can be really stupid.
@@VauxhallViva1975 Tipper Gore's gift to the metal and hard rock genre lol
That lawyer speaking at the end sums up the bias and pettiness this lawsuit was based on. "I'll file another suit tomorrow. One of them will win." How'd that work out for you? Heavy Metal is still around but that guy's likely not a practicing attorney anymore. There were exactly two people responsible for those deaths, and they are both dead. Music can affect moods and emotions, it is intended to do so, but it can't make anyone take any specific action. That's a choice made exclusively by the listener.
Both of those guys were already extremely troubled & already seemed on the path of taking their own lives. Can't blame Judas Priest or CBS Records for that!! They made the choice, so therefore they're the only ones to blame here. Also, that lawyer was an absolute joke, & this trial was a complete waste of taxpayers money.
I live in Reno if someone can find his name I'll go to his house and blast Painkiller
@@brandonpage7087 It was a "WITCH HUNT".
Bill Hicks had a great bit about this: "WHAT band wants their audience dead? This makes no sense!"
ruclips.net/video/EOfFRDryVQM/видео.html
What a brutal and awful situation. I’m glad Priest performed that song on their Painkiller tour as a big F You to everyone there
They should have played it live backwards
@@rockerjim8045 az long az it soundz good back/forwordz l give a shit
@@rockerjim8045 lol yeah they're talented enough. I'd love to see that for their 50th anniversary as a band ❤ (Or has their 50th passed already? Must look that up...)
As a local kid nearby to Sparks, Nevada I followed the lawsuit and court case as it happened. What an embarrassment that this was allowed to go that far...
Ridiculous but probably necessary to show that Priest was innocent in the case!!!!!\M/
Way back in the mid nineties, I was a student at the University of Lethbridge, and I took a first year psychology class that was taught by multiple profs. One of them was Dr. Vokey, who was an expert witness at this trial because of his experience with subliminal messages in music. In one of his classes, we went into great detail about this trial. He played, over and over, the part of the song that was supposed to have the phrase "do it". It was his conclusion that it was just a combination of multiple unintentional sounds from the drums, guitar, and voice. It was such an incredibly interesting class, and this trial was an incredible waste of time!
At the end of the day a man is responsible for his own actions. Priest had no fault at all here. 🤟
That whole trial was nothing more than a needless waste of both time and taxpayer money, all for the sake of satisfying a bunch of overly religious zealots looking for a scapegoat as to why their two sons are dead so they can avoid all the responsibility on their part.
Isn’t it great how far we’ve come since then, right? … oh wait…
Religious zealots are entitled by their tax exempt status and believe tax payers should subsidize their beliefs.
It wasn't just the zealots they were satisfying. The hysteria was believed by tons of regular middle class people who fell for it. They weren't all Republican and conservative either. Plenty of them were liberals too. Evangelical crap infected the mainstream and it was bizarre. It was basically the qanon of the 80s.
@@PinkyJujubean
Frankly speaking, I don't really care about the whole Republican/Conservative vs. Democrat/Liberal voodoo very much since both sides of the isle tend to be heavily infested with much hypocrisy and double talk as well as a fair share of charlatans who are easily susceptible to their deceptive methods on one level or another.
@@PinkyJujubean Pretty much. That's why that parental guidance group that formed back then was formed by a liberal woman at the forefront, backed by wives of conservatives. They all had the same twisted opinion when it came to rock/metal and rap music.
After the trial there was an interview with the guys from Judas Priest and they said if there would be a secret message in their songs it would be 'go and buy more of our records'. It is crazy that this trial and the one with Ozzy even happened at all.
Nike “just do it”. Sue them … they have lots of money …
When this was going on and being covered by the news, my Father summed it up the best with this comment about the whole ordeal. "If someone goes and kills themselves over a song then they had something wrong with them to begin with".
I feel bad for the two young guys. Not only did they obviously come from troubled backgrounds, their families were so firmly in denial about it that they (the families) made absurd claims to distance themselves from any responsibility. Judas Priest may have been one of the few sources of joy those guys had.
If they hadn't killed themselves, they could have listened to lots more Judas Priest.
Yeah but the survivor, James Vance, turned on his favorite band and sued them!! Shameful!!
I LOVE Judas Priest. Went to see them 4 times. Heard every song and Stained Class is one of my favorite albums. Never ever felt like unaliving myself. Wanted to party my brains out. Only thing I hurt because of Judas Priest was my hearing and a few brain cells 😂
Honestly, as dumb as it would've been to sue the makers of the alcohol they were drinking (a thought which apparently never occurred to the parents), it would've been considerably less dumb than suing Judas Priest.
I don't study law but I presume the makers of alcohol already won that case many years ago. What made this ridiculous claim plausible at the time was the fact it had never been pursued in court before.
This is a case I always found interesting, so thank you for covering it. I realize there was the "Satanic Panic" of the 1980s and lyrics in metal were scrutinized to fit that narrative and as someone who is now a parent myself, I am happy that there is a Parental Advisory warning on albums with explicit lyrics. However, speaking from experience I have been listening to metal since I was 12-years-old (2000) and my parents were permissive and let me listen to anything I wanted. I realize every situation is different and I'm not intending to come off as self righteous or preachy, but some of this would fall on the parents and understanding that their child may be physically mature, but not emotionally mature and as D Wade put it, at the end of the day a person is responsible for their own actions.
You know that sticker is just a recommendation for a good album to piss of your parents?
Well-stated.
@@twistoffate4791 Thank you for the kind words.
Why did you become a parent?
@@Incel_81Probably the same reason most parents become parents.
Suicide is never the answer...
But JUDAS PRIEST usually is. 🤘
If they were to put secret messages on there, I would think it would say "buy more of our music we become more rich"
Fun Fact: Steve Dillon and Garth Ennis created a character named Arseface in their Preacher comic book series off of this case.
I been listening to Priest- and Ozzy- since 1981... I'm still here!
Me too I've been listening to them since 89 and I'm still here
If bands really could influence fans with subliminal messages, they wouldn't be telling them to kill themselves. They'd be telling them to buy more albums and go to more concerts.
I took my girlfriend, a Christian school kindergarten teacher, to see Priest back in March and she had no problems being there 🤷♀️
I would have loved to have been a part of Judas Priests legal team. My first question to the Plaintiffs team would be “Could you demonstrate how you managed to play the track backwards”
When the band that I used to be in went to the studio to record, we were sitting around one evening with the engineer after we had finished for the day. He was making us copies of the unmixed tracks onto cassette so we could take them home to listen. Anyway, we were messing around with the tape, running it backwards and we were hearing all kinds of funny sh*t. My favorite was "I am the grandma!" 😂
Gramps?
I AM THE TABLE
How do you play a cassette backwards with a Cassette player for home use. Has that function ever been available?
@@rockerjim8045 Not that I know of. The tape he was playing backwards was on reel to reel. He was just copying it to cassette for us.
@@scottbubb2946 cheers. I was thinking about the Lads. There Album was either Vinyl or Cassette. neither could be played backwards with a home player. With a Vinyl LP you would have to stand next to the player and turn the record Anti clockwise at a constant speed whilst taking in what you heard. This story seems ludicrous
Stained Class! Beyond The Realms Of Death is badass! Glenn Tipton's solo in that song is amazing!
Favorite priest song
Sounds like these parents should have tried to sue Nike.
Honestly, it's preposterous. "Let's kill the people buying our products!" said no one ever.
If you can only hear the message when played backwards then it can't be subliminal, you would have to play it forwards for this to be the case and the message would have to be among the existing lyrics/music, it's supposed to be backwards so you would only hear garbled nonsense. A child could figure this out.
I just bought tickets to see Judas Priest in November!
I love that an "evil" band would go to lengths to put messages in their music that could drive people to take their own lives, but would have "Eff the Lord" as one of them. I mean, that's a pretty un rock and roll way to say "Fuck"
I get high on pot because when i turn Queens "Another one bites the dust" backwards the backmasking says "its fun to smoke marijuana".
Damn you Freddie.
Lol
@@lisasmokette6511 you're as old as i am in if you understand what I'm talking about.
My friend got me 'Judas Priest's Greatest Hits" for my 10th birthday. It was a cassette with just 4 songs on it and has me loving metal to this day. As I grew up in a Catholic, conservative Ireland, there was a lot of prejudice. I came home from school once to my mother and our local parish priest waiting for me because I had a "Master of Puppets" poster on my wall and told me how evil my Slayer, Sepultura, etc tapes were. I remember Metal Church had a song on their "Human Factor" album called "In Mourning" which articulated the metal community's feelings about this. I also remember Sacred Reich's "Who's to blame" too. It's sad to still see such narrowmindedness still affecting America. I don't think it's unlikely another West Memphis Three won't happen again...
Heroes End is about James Dean, Jimmy Hendrix, and Janis Joplin.
Ahhh the good old days. I miss the 80s. Metal RULES!!!
"Five years from now we'll all know that music causes violence and death among adolescents." He says confidently lol. What a clown!
Judas Priest been one of my top 2 fav metal bands since 1979. JP and IM.
But wait ...If you just put Your message on Album outhere FORWARD. Way more will understand it .... And it wont damage Needle/Record playing Backwards ....
" Stained Class " is just a Kick A$$ Record!! PLAY LOUD
I remember Bill Hicks making a joke about this
Oh my gosh I remember this! I thought then and still believe it to be so. That those two young men were troubled. They were gonna do what they were gonna do no matter whose music they were listening to. It just so happened it was JP.
❤️💜💚
So he died 3 years after and when he died he had a 1 year old. So somebody had a baby with him after being horribly disfigured. That's the real story
This!!
Subliminal messages are real. I played a Deicide song backwards, and it told me how to make a glass of chocolate milk. 😂😂😂
This lawsuit probably boosted their album sales.
it certainly did. They made a killing
"mum, my chair is broken"
LOL :D
Just like the Ozzy Osbourne case and in some ways like the AC/DC / Richard Ramirez situation, the media and the families needed a scape goat for a court case win, so they chose Judas Priest. The documentary about this case seemed to shed a better light on Rob Halford & his band mates on their innocence but also seemed to expose the truth about how neglectful and poor the two boys’ parents were truly. In the end, I do hope these guys are in a better place and resting in peace.
their innocence? its very clear these low lives are extremely satanic, purposely putting harmful lyrics aimed at so many vulnerable minds.. but no its all the parents fault right.. you sound like a drug pusher that's selling death by pill & when someone overdoses over your drug, it's their fault not yours right? in the end it really does matter what you put out there.. when you end it all like that, there is no rest or peace 4 you, RUclips "tamara laroux attempt" watch it for yourself.. 😔
I wrote a paper on this when I was in college, around the time the trial happened.
Why didn't the boys mother sue the beer company????
If I heard "Do it" subliminally over and over and became influenced to "do it" I would be nailing women left and right, not killing myself 🙄
TikTok videos do more harm to kids than Metal ever did
Tiktok videos don't do shit. It's the same witch hunting from clueless old people, just in a different decade.
I listened to Judas Priest 21 years ago for the first time, drunk some alcohol and did some drugs. Still alive tho.
The same people who thought Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis were evil for playing the devil's music and shaking their hips.
I recommend Halfords biography. Given what happened to him the year before it really is tragic. He goes into this pretty extensively.
Having to hide your sexuality for so long because it wasn’t approved of (especially in the Metal community) must have been absolute hell for Halford.
@@scott12xu ONLY Band wher the Singer doesnt get all the Girls ......
He goes into all of that pretty explicitly too. There were a couple of lucky fans though
Downing also spends a lot of time in his autobiography discussing the trial.
These parents would lose their minds with W.A.P.
Wap?? Lol,did u mean WASP?
@@dwade6322 I think he means Cardi B.
TBF W.A.P is a bad song both lyrically and musically.
How come nobody ever sued Nike for saying "just do it" to literally every suicidal person on Earth?
I just don't understand things like this. I listened to everything from Priest to Maiden to Ozzy to Eminem. I drank and smoked myself stupid. I blew enough lines to keep the Bolivian economy afloat for a year. I've heard music backwards. And yet I have never, EVER, thought about picking up a gun and blowing my head or someone else's head off. I guess people just need someone or something to point the finger at.
I'm a huge supporter of free speech and artistic freedom. There's enough negative messages in music, advertising, politics and wherever you want to look that there's no need to play things backwards. Living in a free society has it's risks but I'm willing to take them.
Now think about it. During this trial multiple people listened to this song frontwards and backwards. Nobody in the courtroom killed anybody or committed suicide. Why is that?
I remember when this happened Priest's statement was "if we were going to put a message on there it would be 'buy more records, go to the concert"😃👍🏼
Stained Class is amazing btw
Do it? Do what, mow the lawn? As Rob asks.
In the aftermath of the subliminal message trial, a friend and I said that we should start a metal band and put our own subliminal messages in the songs. Things like:
Go get ice cream
Adopt a cat and pamper it
Drive the speed limit
Hug your mom and tell her you love her
Real subversive, deviant behavior metal stuff to be sure.
Many artists have. Weird Al's are hilarious.
"In 5yrs, subliminal messages will be common"
Still waiting!?
i would like to see one video talking why Richie Kotzen left poison , they had only one album and was working for them 🤔
I thought he was kicked out for messing with the drummer's wife or something.
They've talked about it lots of times.
There is a subliminal Do It. it made me do the dishes, I wanna sue!
1) Drinking 2) Smoking weed 3) Listening to music. The MUSIC must have led to their horrible decision!
I feel bad for the families too... when something horrific and senseless happens, the survivors will go to any lengths to find a reason why. In many cases, it becomes a just-as-senseless scapegoat.
Well, interestingly enough, when Staind was starting to get big, a couple of kids, in Detroit, one of the kids had filmed himself playing Outside and had the video on repeat as he killed himself, and that was the incident that inspired the song waste on Break the Cycle... and it bothered Aaron and Mike
If I had to listen to Staind, I'd probably do the same thing
I used to listen to Staind, I'm glad I flushed that turd.
Staind makes life worse so this checks out.
People claiming that 'cancel culture' is a recent thing have no memory of the satanic panic
I love seeing these blasts from the past. Reminds me of those days.
I still don't understand how this ever got past the fact that IT WAS A COVER SONG.
Sued over lyrics he merely performed, but didn't write? I don't know much about the legal system, but how could the entire defense not be as simple as "If you don't like the song, take it up with Spooky Tooth. 🤷♂️"
I too was mesmerized by Judas Priest. But if anything it made me want to keep living so I could listen to more Judas Priest and learn to play guitar
That's what I have always thought,it's a stupid business model to have someone kill themselves and then not buy the next album.Its ridiculous.
Even to most upsetting lyrics in Chinese can not be understood if you don't speak Chinese. So how can be something that only backwards can be understood have a meaning that is understood?
Judas has no idea what they won here. Tipper and her hen's could have really changed the ways of Music today... Very sad how this band ended up today. They were a Amazing band to see bk in the 80s.
damn, i'v listened to Stained Glass a pile of times and i'm still alive? i must be listening to it wrong
Rob Halford UnPlugged in the Courtroom
As soon as I heard “do it.” I immediately did all my assignments and got an a
At the time (as reported in the UK) I thought it collapsed because of the band showing other examples of backwards lyrics, and that the judge remarked on how much technical equipment it took to make it even vaguely clear of the lyric (I guess the random combination of sounds bit).
Didnt know they didnt even wright the song.
I was a kid but I felt bad for everyone except the lawyers. Eff them. It’s a sad story really and must have been difficult for the band members too. I didn’t know the other guy died a few years later.
I partook in many inebrients back in the day . I grew up in the 80's and listened to this band and this song hundreds of times. Not once did i feel like opting out . My Dad had guns and so did i but it never crossed my mind to take one of them and blow my brains out.these two suffered from some kind of mental deficiency and its sad. But to blame a rock band? Please. The family got taken in by money grubbing lawyers and shame on them for doing so. They have clearly missed any signs their children were in trouble and looked for a target to blame when all they had to do was look in a mirror.
Write a horror story Critically Acclaimed, make a horror movie Critically Acclaimed Write a song Devil Worshiper.
That prosecutor at the end was the reason I hate lawyers. He is saying we didn't get them this time but it's the beginning. Like he honestly thought bands are trying to kill the people that buy their music, or wants to nail a band with it regardless. What an idiot. And why didn't they bring the makers of the alcohol to trial, since it probably had more factors in the shootings then the music.
What's the message in Love Bites?
That's your next video. What is the subliminal message on Love Bites?
Same as the "forward" lyrics at that moment in the song.
@@imaouima thanks
I've made most of my abstract noise backwards deliberately...but mine is hilarious 😆
Why didn't they sue the beer/ alcohol makers too ? 🤣🤣🤣
There was NO subliminal message in that song!! It simply did not exist!!!
The court just wanted a free concert
The mothers of these two boys were absolutely clueless. Belknap obviously blamed Judas Priest’s music because he couldn’t face the fact that he and Vance inherited these problems from their troubled upbringing.
The only people that should be held accountable are the parents for poor parenting. This court case is a waste of time and money, and that lawyer is an idiot.
so I've heard about them being sued in Idaho.. what does this in Nevada have to do with it
Oh America. You're so funny.
The thing I never got about backwards messages... We don't comprehend backwards talking, so how would that have any effect?
For those who don’t know!! Gary Wright Mr. Dream Weaver is the man who wrote the awesome Better By You, Better Than Me. Too bad these guys killed them selves. In the words of Jigsaw Live Or Die Make Your Choice. They chose death!! No law suit to be had.
i never understood how anyone could assume that a 'backmasked' phrase would "control" people...first off, you gotta have a LOT of free time to listen to music the Wrong Way-- especially back then, when Cassettes and Vinyls were the only medium to listen to it...i mean sure, Nowadays, anyone with a half-decent wristwatch can download Audacity and flip around all kinds of music, but i highly doubt kids in the 80s were saying "lets hand-spin a vinyl Backwards and do what it says!" and even if there WERE backmasked-subliminal messages, it only takes a fraction of a neuron to decide "nah, id rather Not kill myself" even though a song 'told you' to...they arent Hypnotized, they arent Mind-Controlled, they have the Free Will to pull whatever trigger they were going to regardless...
...and on top of that, wasnt that "purposefully backmasked" recording (on the 7-years-later album) just a reversed recording of phrases like "Stay In School" or "Eat Your Vegetables"? something objectively Positive, yet theres no correlating upswing of Well-Behaved metalheads, thus there Must Not be a correlation to the Negative effects...?
What a bunch of nutters these people were. So glad common sense prevailed in the end..
These lawsuits are a crock. The blame should fall on the parents for not being aware of the fellas mental state. Like my Mom worried about me gonna kill myself after my friend did that was into metal. Sorry Mom, but metal didn't make my friend kill himself.....it was his home life- parents which happened to also be my Moms married in- laws who were rich alcoholics who fought all the time. Sorry Mom, Ozzy and Maiden didn't make my friend kill himself, it was your his parents
That would be like saying a guy that breaks up with a girl is responsible for her death, if she kills herself because of it. People make their own choices.
"I would certainly file another one tomorrow morning."
That's ego talking...