Sanctions watch

“The state justices urged trial judges to examine proposed court orders “with the understanding that artificial intelligence software, with all of its potential risks and benefits, may have been used”.”

“Citing fake cases in court filings and other materials handed up to the court is an abuse of process and is tantamount to making a false statement … Unchecked, it can lead to a miscarriage of justice.”

“Ms. Lee forthrightly acknowledges the fact that her factum was created using ChatGPT and contains fake cases.”

“there would be a “discussion” at the end of the trial about how the initial submissions were prepared”

“In doing so, the intern acted without authorization, without disclosure, and contrary to not only chambers policy but also the relevant law school policy.”

“Counsel relied upon unvetted AI – in his telling, via inadequately supervised colleagues – to defend his use of unvetted AI”

“pervasive inaccurate, misleading, and fabricated citations, quotations, and representations of legal authority”

“the attorneys’ actions were “embarrassing and certainly negligent.””

“The cases he has cited either do not exist, or do not have anything to do with what he has cited them for.”

“Whether accidental or deliberate, reliance on false citations is a serious matter [see Zhang v Chen, 2024 BCSC 285].”

“if fines and public embarrassment were effective deterrents, there would not be so many cases to cite.”

“the court wonders if this citation may be the result of an AI generated hallucination”

“Plaintiffs cannot be sure, but the motion’s inclusion of fabricated citations and quotations are hallmarks of an AI generated motion with ‘hallucinations,’”

“"The liability for using these new technologies without proper supervision falls squarely on the attorney. AI is a powerful tool, but it lacks professional judgment and a duty of candor to the court. Attorneys must remain the final check, or they will be held accountable for the errors it produces."”

“the case simply does not exist”

““People are going to use [AI], and the courts are not going to be able to be a dam across a river that’s already flowing at flood capacity,””

“It is entirely understandable that litigants in person should resort to artificial intelligence for help.”

“This sounds like something that derived from an artificial intelligence source. It has all the hallmarks of ChatGPT, or some similar AI tool.”

““an unrepresented person is still under a duty not to mislead the court””

“to put client letters and decision letters from the Home Office into an open source AI tool, such as ChatGPT, is to place this information on the internet in the public domain, and thus to breach client confidentiality and waive legal privilege, and thus any regulated legal professional or firm that does so would, in addition to needing to bring this to the attention of their regulator, be advised to consult with the Information Commissioner’s Office.”

“Submitting a brief with fictitious caselaw is a recipe for sanctions.”

“courts “should not have to parse case citations and parentheticals to discern whether cases exist.””

“The irony.”

“This is not sufficient disclosure.”

“the court accepted his explanation that he believed the AI tool had anti-hallucination protection”

““While assistance in preparing complaints is not improper, a complainant remains responsible for the accuracy of allegations made on his behalf.””

““Unfortunately, for me at least, the tangential scattergun, smorgasbord approaches and references coupled with euphemisms formed outside of Europe approaches of this tool were a poor second to human oversight, I have come to expect and anticipate in actual statement and representation during a case.””

“Those who use artificial intelligence to conduct legal research notwithstanding these risks have a professional duty to check the accuracy of such research by reference to authoritative sources, before using it in the course of their professional work.”

““carried with it risks as well as opportunities”.”

“While the Court does not prohibit counsel from using generative AI tools, counsel must comply with Rule 11(b), including confirmation that cases cited within a brief exist.”

“if the citation was an AI 'hallucination', that would be 'analogous to relying on bogus evidence' and represent a procedural irregularity.”

“Morgan has made no showing that he has learned from his mistakes in that case.”

“It became apparent that the claimant had used a generative AI tool to assist her in producing her written submissions.”

“The tribunal is aware of the growing use of artificial intelligence and it would appear that an AI tool was used to prepare the Respondent’s grounds of appeal.”

“the court emphasized citing non‑existent cases generated by AI constitutes an “unacceptable” “abuse of the adversary system.””

““We attach no blame to him, since he is a litigant in person but we have recorded the names so that others do not fall into the same trap.””

“The careless use of generative artificial intelligence to "save time" by not independently confirming citations is instead a waste of judicial resources and ...”

“like an idiot”

“multiple inaccurate quotations or citations”

“Justice Lukasz Granosik noted that the cited authorities appeared to be AI "hallucinations" with no basis in law.”

“The Court ruled that even a single factitious citation violates its orders and justifies striking filings.”

““It should be obvious that any attorney who uses AI must scrupulously review its work product to ensure that the cited cases exist and that the citations accurately and fairly represent the underlying case law,””

“Reliance on Gen-AI does not excuse or ease this requirement.”

“the critical failing as the fact that the reviewing lawyer did not properly check the accuracy of the document before it was filed and served”

“"Counsel cannot discharge those obligations by relying on a paralegal, much less on an artificial intelligence program."”

“"Rule 11 is clear," Judge Oliver said, referring to a federal civil procedure rule that requires lawyers to ensure their arguments are supported by current law or a good-faith basis for modifying current law.”

“Material parts of the arbitrator’s reasons relied on false references to authorities.”

““While I reviewed the cited cases generally to confirm their applicability, as well as many other cases that I reviewed, I did not double check the quotations and obviously did not read the cited cases carefully,” Greaves wrote.”

“While the use of [generative AI] is not necessarily problematic, the failure to confirm the accuracy of the filing is. ... Plaintiff’s pro se status does not relieve her of this requirement.”

“We do not have a double standard for those represented by counsel and those who are unrepresented – we expect all to follow our procedures. … We have repeatedly stressed that self-represented litigants and attorneys alike have a duty to independently verify the authenticity and veracity of all sources and assertions when relying on artificial intelligence tools to prepare trial or appellate court filings.”

“the deployment of undisclosed generative AI has not affected or perverted the result of this application and for this Ms Jones and Sentinel should be grateful”

“Robert’s reliance on fictitious authority is a pervasive, nascent, and very serious issue afflicting courts as the use and reliance on generative AI in preparing legal filings becomes more commonplace. … Robert’s self-represented status does not excuse his misuse of AI. … A monetary penalty in this context should impress upon all litigants the caution one must undertake when utilizing AI in brief preparation and the solemnity of filing documents before the court.”

“Judges spoke of AI that had “run amok”.”

“Courts and opposing counsel are burdened by the careless use of AI by pro se filers.”

“The Upper Tribunal pointedly noted that it cannot afford to have its limited resources absorbed by representatives who place false information before the Tribunal.”

“Respondent’s conduct in this regard is a patent violation of the Rules of Court and alone, merits striking his brief.”

“It would be naive to assume that there will not be an increasing use of artificial intelligence in legal work in future; indeed, that may be both necessary and beneficial.”

“There was a case of Mercy vs Mankind which does not exist,”

“The reference to the 2014 case was the result of AI hallucination.”

“Submitting a brief with fictitious caselaw is a recipe for sanctions and a clear violation of Rule 11(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure.”

““close and careful attorney supervision, fact-checking, and citation-checking are absolute necessities when utilizing AI or any of its subsets.””

“our reaction to the quotation errors in Jones's brief.”

“"a lawyer shall not knowingly make a false statement of material fact or law to a tribunal."”

““This Court does not find any illegality in the impugned order. Merely because non-existing citations were referred due to the use of Artificial Intelligence Tool, without due verification, the order would not be vitiated, when the law stated in the order and its application is correct”.”

“requested the plaintiff and his lawyer to check in future that references found via search engines or generative AI are not hallucinations.”

“However, the court did not impose any sanctions, as the incident occurred before a relevant regulation came into force.”

“In other words, the Court must be concerned with the message sent to other lawyers, firms and non represented parties as to the consequences of cutting corners, by using tools such as ChatGPT or even AI modules offered by reputable legal research databases without adequate care, or otherwise failing to verify the accuracy of citations and assertions in legal filings.”

“one cited case was “totally fake” and another was “almost real” because there is a case with the name, but it is a state case instead of a federal case as indicated.”

“The Court has refrained from discharging the show cause order pending counsel's preparation of the article.”

“while “there is no proof that AI was, in fact the author” of a Cal State brief, the document “bears all the hallmarks of the hallucinations associated with AI-generated texts” and contains a series of misquotes Cal State failed to explain.”

“it is “among the fundamental obligations of the legal profession neither to invent citations nor to include unverified sources suggested by a chatbot in a court filing.””

“Counsel shall not file or otherwise present to the court any documents which contain AI-hallucinated citations or fictitious or non-existent legal citations.”

““Delivering a factum containing non-existent legal submissions creates a serious risk of a miscarriage of justice.””

“A judicial decision relying on fake or hallucinated precedents is no decision in law.”

“Dr. Sawyer's citation to non-existent sources due to his use of an artificial intelligence tool without adequate verification of the sources generated by the artificial intelligence tool, while perhaps warranting an award of costs in favor the defense and permitting cross examination of Dr. Sawyer during the trial on his failure to verify the sources cited in his report, does not warrant exclusion of his opinions as they are otherwise the product of reliable scientific methodology and are supported by "good grounds," especially given "the liberal thrust of the Federal Rules of Evidence, the flexible nature of the Daubert inquiry, and the proper roles of the judge and jury in evaluating the ultimate credibility of an expert's opinion" ….”

“There has been an approach, which I will adopt, of redacting false case citations so that such information is not further propagated by AI systems.”

“The Court held that an order is not vitiated by the mere inclusion of non-existent AI-generated citations if the legal principles applied to the facts are correct under the law of the land.”

“technical mistake”

“Given that the Laredo Division is one of the busiest court dockets in the nation, there are scant resources to spare ferreting out erroneous AI citations in the first place, let alone surveying the burgeoning caselaw on this subject,”

“It was identified that there are “serious implications on the administration of justice and public confidence in the justice system if AI is misused””

“undermines the overall credibility”

“The judge said public shaming, as well as the fact that the lawyer took full responsibility for the errors and committed to remedial measures, was enough.”

“to bring home to all lawyers the need to check and not to trust factums [sic] generated by AI or by others”

“"Hallucinations" are instances in which artificial intelligence tools fabricate case citations, misquote authorities, or generate non-existent legal sources,”

“The AI-generated fake cases left the court with “no choice but to survey the case law regarding attorney misconduct relating to the use of AI” rather than “resolving a routine matter of civil procedure,””

“narrowly and somewhat reluctantly”

““When I read the brief that was signed by three attorneys from your firm, I had a problem,” he told King and fellow lawyer Thomas E. Breth. “I read what I believe to be artificial intelligence hallucinations.””

“Citing fake cases in court filings and other materials handed up to the court is an abuse of process and is tantamount to making a false statement to the court. Unchecked, it can lead to the miscarriage of justice.”

“whether the inaccurate representations are made by a lawyer or a self-represented party”

“the court considers the matter resolved and no further action is necessary”

“In November 2023, a Colorado disciplinary judge approved a suspension of one year and one day, with 90 days to serve, for violations including competence, diligence, and candor to the tribunal.”