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Sanctions watch

Every incident where a lawyer got caught filing AI-fabricated citations. The Hall of Shame.

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862
Incidents tracked
270
Incidents in 2026
$2,460,870
In fines, where reported
214 of 862 report an amount

The curve

Incidents per month

Last 18 months of published incidents, by the date of the court's order.

May 2025 Oct 2026

Charting 451 of 862 incidents; the rest are undated or fall outside this window.

Blamed by name

ChatGPT 148 Claude 9 CoCounsel 8 Copilot 8 Gemini 8 Lexis+ AI 6 AI-assisted legal software 4 Westlaw Precision 4 ChatGPT-4o 2 ChatOn 2 Eve 2 Google AI 2 LEAP 2 Perplexity AI 2 AI Overviews 1 Archie 1 Centient AI 1 ChatGPT-4 1 ClearBrief 1 CoCounsel, Westlaw Precision, Google Gem 1 Descrybe.ai 1 First Drafts 1 GPT-3.5 1 Ghostwriter Legal 1 Google Scholar 1 Grammarly 1 Grok 1 Irys 1 Legal Genius 1 LegalAI 1 MX2.law 1 OpenCase 1 Strongsuit 1 vLex Fastcase 1

Counts only incidents where the filing court or the reporting named the tool.

Hall of Shame

All Fined 251 Caught, not sanctioned 198 Warned 124 Referred to the bar 103 Reprimanded 85 Outcome unclear 57 Filing dismissed 41 Suspension 2 Upcoming sanction 1
Caught, not sanctioned ChatGPT 2023-01-01
Mrs Harber cited nine FTT decisions in her appeal to the First-Tier Tax Tribunal, but the tribunal and HMRC found that these cases did not exist and were generated by an AI system.
Harber v Commissioners for His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs [2023] UKFTT 1007 (TC) · Mrs Harber · First-tier Tribunal (Tax Chamber)
burges-salmon.com ↗
The file →
  • Harber v Commissioners for HMRC involved a self-represented appellant
  • Appellant submitted fictitious cases generated using ChatGPT to support a tax penalty appeal
  • The tribunal rejected the fake authorities and imposed no formal sanction due to her unrepresented status
  • Decided by the First-tier Tribunal (Tax Chamber) in the UK
  • Established early precedent that AI-generated fake cases carry no judicial weight
Fined $15K ChatGPT 2023-01-01
Two lawyers filed a brief with fake cases after one used ChatGPT; the court imposed a $5,000 fine on each lawyer and the firm.
2023 case in the US district court for the southern district of New York · US District Court for the Southern District of New York · NY
“The summaries of the decisions cited in the brief showed “stylistic and reasoning flaws that do not generally appear in decisions issued by United States Courts of Appeals.””
lawsociety.org.zw ↗
The file →
  • Two lawyers and their law firm were sanctioned in the US.
  • They filed a brief citing non-existent cases and could not produce them.
  • The court imposed a $5,000 fine on each lawyer and the firm, totaling $15,000.
  • US court; federal jurisdiction implied by the cited courts of appeals.
  • In 2023; one lawyer had asked ChatGPT to provide supporting evidence.

Showing 861–862 of 862.

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