Tracker

Sanctions watch

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

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Incidents tracked

Incidents in 2026

$35,877

In fines, where reported

3 of 3 report an amount

The curve

Incidents per month

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

Mar 2025 Dec 2025 Aug 2026

Charting 2 of 3 incidents — the rest are undated or fall outside this window.

Blamed by name

ChatGPT 156 Claude 9 Copilot 8 Gemini 7 Lexis+ AI 4 LegalAI 3 Westlaw Precision 3 ChatOn 2 CoCounsel 2 LEAP 2 AI-assisted legal software 1 AI-based legal software 1 Archie 1 Centient AI 1 ChatGPT-4o 1 Descrybe.ai 1 Eve 1 GPT-3.5 1 Generative artificial intelligence (unsp 1 Ghostwriter Legal 1 Google AI Overview 1 Google Scholar 1 Grammarly 1 Grok 1 Legal Genius 1 Lexis 1 Lexis Nexis 1 Morgan & Morgan’s in-house Artificial In 1 OpenCase 1 OpenLaw 1 Perplexity AI 1 Westlaw CoCounsel 1 Westlaw’s CoCounsel 1 in-house AI database 1

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

Hall of Shame

All Fined 2 Caught, not sanctioned 1

Showing 3 incidents involving Westlaw Precision. Clear filters

Fined $1K Westlaw Precision

A lawyer blamed Westlaw Precision for hallucinated citations, but the judge found the citations came from a suspended lawyer's work and imposed a $1,000 penalty.

Louisiana court imposed a $1,000 penalty · Louisiana court · LA

arstechnica.com ↗

The file →

Louisiana case involving an unnamed lawyer
She blamed Westlaw Precision for AI hallucinations in citations
$1,000 penalty
Louisiana court, Louisiana
The judge found she had outsourced the research to a currently suspended lawyer

Caught, not sanctioned $30K Westlaw Precision 2026-07-14

A lawyer filed fabricated case law, and the court imposed a CLE sanction, civil contempt, and an adverse costs order.

In re Rosslyn2016, LLC, et al. · S.D. Texas (Bankruptcy) · TX

damiencharlotin.com ↗

The file →

In re Rosslyn2016, LLC, et al.; lawyer not named on the page.
The filing used Westlaw Precision and contained fabricated case law and misrepresented case law.
The court ordered CLE, civil contempt, and an adverse costs order totaling $29,877.
S.D. Texas (Bankruptcy); federal bankruptcy court in Texas.
2026-07-14; the page flags a disputed vendor claim.

Fined $5K Westlaw Precision 2026-06-03

Two Orange County immigration attorneys filed a brief with nonexistent cases and misattributed quotations; the Ninth Circuit suspended each for six months and fined each $2,500.

Lnu v. Blanche · Mike Singh Sethi; Sethi Law Group; William Rounds; Bill Rounds Attorney at Law PC · U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

“We issue this disciplinary order, and explain our reasoning at some length, as a warning to the members of this Court's bar: be aware of the risks of overreliance on generative AI, read everything cited in a court filing—whether drafted by generative AI or not—and disclose quickly and transparently generative AI hallucinations that are inadvertently included in court filings….”

Cases that don't exist

Eduardo v. Garland, 28 F.4th 742 (9th Cir. 2022)
Lay v. Holder, 729 F.3d 962 (9th Cir. 2013)

abajournal.com ↗

The file →

LNU v. Blanche; attorney Mike Singh Sethi was sanctioned with co-counsel William Rounds.
He filed briefs with nonexistent cases and misattributed quotations, later calling them typographical errors.
The Ninth Circuit suspended him from practice before the court for six months.
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit; Judge Richard Paez, Carlos Bea, and Danielle Forrest.
The order said generative AI hallucinations had been included in filings and warned lawyers to read every citation.

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