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Sam Altman was greeted by an unexpected visitor during an on-stage talk last week, with the billionaire AI CEO being handed a real court summons in a situation that left him speechless.
Dramatically being served is something that most people think is reserved for the silver screen, yet it does seemingly still happen in real life, as long as the situation calls for it.
It has traditionally been used to ensure undeniable confirmation of a court summons, specifically relating to instances when an individual might want to avoid legal involvement for whatever reason.
Having someone declare their name and be given the court summons directly ensures that there's no question of their knowledge of the situation, and Sam Altman was on the receiving end of this during a talk with basketball coach Steve Kerr at the Sydney Goldstein Theater in San Francisco.
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Video of the Sam Altman subpoena incident (don't think this has been shared on X yet) https://t.co/AWdO9RMgC3 pic.twitter.com/uVm8HlX9iL
— Tom Bibby (@tombibbys) November 6, 2025
As reported by Futurism, video footage of the incident shared on social media shows a man wearing a cap and backpack approach the stage, declaring that he had a "subpoena for Sam Altman."
He was approached by event security and loudly booed by the crowd before being ushered away, and it appears as if Altman himself wasn't the recipient of the document that the man attempted to hand over.
Manny Yekutiel, the moderator of the talk between Altman and Kerr, remarked that things were "getting off to a dramatic start already," and many people including the ChatGPT CEO were left stunned and speechless for a short while.
The San Francisco Public Defender's Office, as per SFGate, has since confirmed that it was one of its employees that attempted to hand over the court summons to Altman, linking the event to an upcoming criminal case.
"An investigator from the San Francisco Public Defender's Office lawfully served a subpoena on Mr. Altman because he is a potential witness in a pending criminal case," a spokesperson illustrated, adding that "our investigators first made several prior attempts to serve the subpoena at Altman's company headquarters and via its online portal."
While it might look absurd when seeing it play out in front of you, it certainly served its purpose as Altman is now legally obliged to attend a trial relating to activists from a group called 'Stop AI', who have previously attempted to block OpenAI employees from entering the company's offices.
A statement from the activist group insists the importance of this trial and Altman's appearance, arguing that "this trial will be the first time in human history where a jury of normal people are asked about the extinction threat that AI poses to humanity."
