What happened
In the Southern District of New York proceeding, a submission included decisions that did not exist and quotations attributed to those fictional decisions. The court examined not only the initial use of a generative tool but also the later conduct after the authorities were questioned.
On 22 June 2023, the court issued an Opinion and Order on Sanctions. The order imposed a joint and several penalty of $5,000 and directed notices to the client and judges falsely identified as authors of the fake opinions.
What the order does not say
The order is not a general statute about artificial intelligence and it does not hold that every AI-assisted draft violates professional rules. It addresses specific submissions, certifications and responses in a federal case. Its practical significance comes from the ordinary verification duties applied to a new failure mode.
A verification protocol
- Search the exact case name and citation in an official or trusted legal database.
- Open the full opinion and verify court, date, procedural posture and quotation.
- Read enough context to confirm that the holding supports the proposition.
- Record the source used by the reviewer.
- If an authority cannot be verified, remove it and correct the record promptly where required.
Product design lesson
A legal AI interface should never make a citation look verified merely because it is formatted well. Draft generation and authority verification are different stages. Judicial AI Assistant instructs the model not to invent authorities and requires user review, but that instruction is a guardrail rather than proof.
Return to the AI lawsuits tracker or read the legal AI verification workflow.