Meta heads into New Mexico trial as jury selection begins Monday
Jury selection is set to begin Monday in New Mexico for the first stand-alone trial brought by state prosecutors against Meta, the parent of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, in a case that is expected to last nearly two months. The trial comes as state and private lawsuits seek to hold social media companies responsible for alleged harms to children, including sexual exploitation risk and effects that prosecutors say contribute to youth mental health struggles.
The New Mexico case is built on a state undercover investigation that used proxy social media accounts and posed as kids to document alleged sexual solicitations and Meta’s response once the behavior was brought to the company’s attention. In the civil complaint filed by Attorney General Raúl Torrez in 2023, prosecutors accuse Meta of creating a marketplace and what the lawsuit describes as a “breeding ground” for predators who target children for sexual exploitation, and of failing to disclose what it knew about the harmful effects.
A key feature of the state’s theory is that New Mexico is not asking the court to hold Meta accountable for content on its platforms in the way a case might focus on individual posts. Prosecutors say instead that the lawsuit targets Meta’s role in pushing out that content through complex algorithms that they say proliferate material harmful to children. That framing is intended to avoid or sidestep legal immunity provisions for social media platforms that prosecutors say have been shielded by First Amendment protections and Section 230 of the U.S. Communications Decency Act.
Torrez is also a focus of other related legal efforts. The Associated Press reported that Torrez brought felony criminal charges of child solicitation by electronic devices against three men in 2024, using decoy social media accounts to build that case.
Meta, for its part, denies the civil charges. The company has described the attorney general’s approach as “sensationalist” and argued that the case draws on cherry-picked documents and includes “sensationalist, irrelevant and distracting arguments.” In a statement cited by the Associated Press, Meta said the nationwide lawsuits attempt to attribute teen mental health struggles to social media companies in a way that it said oversimplifies matters.
Meta’s response also points to changes and controls it has added over time, including account settings and safety features. The Associated Press report said Meta emphasized tools that provide teens more information about the person they are chatting with and content restrictions based on PG-13 movie ratings, while arguing that those measures undercut the state’s allegations.
Outside New Mexico, other cases are already in motion or awaiting their turn in court. More than 40 state attorneys general have filed lawsuits against Meta, alleging it is harming young people and contributing to a youth mental health crisis through product design decisions that they say addict children to social media. Most of those lawsuits were filed in federal court, the Associated Press said.
In California, the Associated Press said opening arguments are scheduled this week for a personal injury case in Los Angeles County Superior Court that could shape how thousands of similar lawsuits against social media companies are handled. The Associated Press also described a bellwether trial underway in California against social video companies, including Meta’s Instagram and Google’s YouTube, focused on a 19-year-old plaintiff who says early exposure to social media became addictive and exacerbated depression and suicidal thoughts. TikTok and Snapchat parent company Snap Inc. settled claims in that case that affects thousands of consolidated plaintiffs.
The Associated Press reported that a separate federal trial set to begin in June in Oakland, California, would be the first to represent school districts suing social media platforms over alleged harms to children. In New Mexico, prosecutors also sued Snap Inc. over allegations that its platform facilitates child sexual exploitation, and the report said Snap denied the accusations and said it has built-in safety guardrails and “deliberate design choices to make it difficult for strangers to discover minors.” A trial date for the Snap matter has not been set.
In New Mexico’s case, a jury drawn from Santa Fe County, including the state capital, will weigh whether Meta engaged in unfair business practices and determine the extent of any findings. The Associated Press reported that a judge will ultimately have final say later on any civil penalties and other remedies, including the question of the public nuisance charge. Under New Mexico’s Unfair Practices Act, the state can seek penalties of $5,000 per violation, though the report said it is not yet clear how violations would be counted.
A Las Cruces-based plaintiff’s attorney, Mollie McGraw, told the Associated Press that the case’s “damage potential” is tied to how Facebook works and how Meta can track who sees content. She said, “Meta keeps track of everyone who sees a post. … The damages here could be significant.” Eric Goldman, codirector of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University School of Law, said a potential outcome would draw attention from regulators and could have wider impact beyond New Mexico.