Judge Dismisses Suicide Suit Against Ozzy Osbourne
LOS ANGELES (AP) _ A judge dismissed a lawsuit Thursday against heavy metal rocker Ozzy Osbourne by the parents of a teen-ager who killed himself while listening to Osbourne’s song ″Suicide Solution.″
Judge John Cole said he would allow the parents of 19-year-old John Daniel McCollum to appeal his ruling, based on allegations that a low-noise hum on the record may have made the youth more susceptible to the lyrics.
The Superior Court judge said the parents’ attorney, Tom Anderson, failed to show why the two songs named in the suit, ″Suicide Solution,″ and ″Paranoid″ should be exempt from First Amendment protection.
″This is not just an ordinary suicide,″ Anderson told Cole. ″John McCollum followed ritualistically what was called for in the record’s lyrics.″
Anderson claimed McCollum listened to ″Suicide Solution″ for five hours before killing himself on Oct. 27, 1984, and said the hum - audible only on headphones such as those McCollum was wearing when he killed himself - reduces the mind’s ability to resist the lyrics.
Osbourne, 37, said the lyrics of the song were actually anti-suicide, and the title, ″Suicide Solution,″ was a reference to alcohol, which had killed a friend of his, Bon Scott of the Australian heavy metal group AC-DC.
″Ozzy is thrilled,″ said his attorney, Howard Weitzman, after speaking to Osbourne in France. ″He was very upset by all of this. He sees himself as a performer and entertainer, and he loves it. To have someone accuse him of intentionally driving people to suicide - it was with him and it bothered him all the time.″
The damage suit filed by Jack McCollum and Geraldine Lugenbuehl of Indio also named CBS Records, Osbourne’s record company, as a defendant.
The couple did not state how much money they wanted in the suit, saying their real goal was to attack music lyrics about sex, death, suicide and drugs.
The song is contained on Osbourne’s ″Blizzard of Oz″ album, which was found on record turntable in the youth’s room after he shot himself.