California fines lawyer $10K for ChatGPT-fabricated citations, warns: verify or face sanctions

A California appeals court fined an attorney $10,000 for filing a brief riddled with ChatGPT-fabricated quotations and issued a public warning to verify all citations. The ruling comes as California courts and the State Bar move to set AI policies amid a surge of fake case citations nationwide. Experts expect more incidents and call for sanctions, training, and education to enforce ethical AI use in law.

Key Points

A California appeals court fined attorney Amir Mostafavi $10,000 after finding that most quotes in his brief were AI-fabricated, and it issued a public warning to verify all citations.
California’s judiciary and bar are rapidly developing AI policies, with courts required to ban or adopt generative AI policies by Dec. 15 and bar ethics updates under consideration.
Incidents of AI-generated fake legal citations are rising sharply, with trackers noting dozens in California and hundreds nationwide, and even some judges have been caught citing fakes.
Research shows significant hallucination rates in legal queries despite widespread plans among lawyers to use AI, and detection may become harder as models grow more capable.
Proposed responses include fines, suspensions, mandatory training, and education to instill ethical, verification-first use of AI in legal practice.

Sentiment

The overall sentiment in the Hacker News discussion is largely condemnatory of the lawyer's actions, agreeing with the article's premise that fabricating legal citations with AI is a severe professional misconduct. However, there is significant disagreement regarding the adequacy of the $10,000 fine, with many commenters arguing it is far too lenient and insufficient as a deterrent. While some acknowledge AI's inevitability in legal practice, the prevailing view emphasizes personal accountability and the critical need for human verification, reflecting a strong demand for higher standards and stricter penalties for such negligence.

In Agreement

Lawyers are personally responsible for all content they submit to a court; blindly signing AI-generated content with fake citations demonstrates unfitness for the profession, regardless of AI use being common or inevitable.
The $10,000 fine, while not a 'zillion doubloons,' is significant for an individual lawyer and serves as a necessary 'warning shot,' especially considering the potential for reputation damage and loss of future business.
Incorrect or fabricated legal information is actively harmful and far worse than no information at all, especially when provided by a hired expert.
The use of AI models known to hallucinate for legal documents is unacceptable; stronger deterrents like higher fines, suspension, or disbarment may be needed.
Using a tool widely known to be flawed for professional services like law, medicine, or engineering is a textbook definition of negligence.
The lawyer's unrepentant stance, suggesting 'victims' are an inevitable 'cost of progress,' indicates the fine was insufficient to foster genuine accountability and requires a greater deterrent.
AI merely enables existing bad behavior or negligence; the core problem is a lawyer failing to properly check their work, which should be standard practice in the legal profession.

Opposed

It is unrealistic and perhaps counterproductive to expect lawyers to cease using AI, as it's an 'inevitable' technological progression akin to online databases replacing physical law libraries; the focus should be on building validation systems rather than outright bans.
AI legal assistants hold significant potential to democratize legal services and make representation more accessible for a wider population who currently cannot afford traditional legal fees.
The $10,000 fine is too lenient, merely 'pocket change' or a 'slap on the wrist' for a lawyer, especially compared to fines for corporations or other minor offenses, and will not effectively deter such serious negligence; calls for much higher fines, suspension, or even jail time were made.
The description of the $10,000 fine as 'historic' is misleading or exaggerated, as it's not a large sum in absolute terms or compared to other fines issued by California for different infractions.
The problem of AI-generated fabrications is not exclusive to lawyers but extends to judges citing fake authority and potentially lawmakers drafting legislation, indicating a systemic issue that AI amplifies.
There's a perceived hypocrisy in demanding severe punishments like jail time for lawyers misusing AI while many in the tech community (programmers) eagerly adopt AI into their own workflows, despite similar risks of unverified output.
Advanced 'grounded' AI tools are already emerging that prevent hallucinations by linking to verified databases, suggesting the current problem is a temporary growing pain that will soon be mitigated by technology.