AI Hallucination Cases

"[134] Même si l’arbitre de griefs est un tribunal administratif moins formel que le sont laCour supérieure ou les autres tribunaux judiciaires, notamment parce que ses règles depreuve sont plus souples, il n’en demeure pas moins que c’est un tribunal. À l’évidence,le procureur qui, devant ce tribunal, s’appuie sur de la jurisprudence doit s’assurer qu’elleexiste.

[135] L’arbitre de griefs s’attend à ce que tous les procureurs qui plaident devant luisoient compétents, honnêtes, professionnels et respectueux de son autorité.Manifestement, celui qui soumet au tribunal des références jurisprudentielles inexistantesne satisfait pas ces attentes, car il induit, intentionnellement ou non, le tribunal et la partieadverse en erreur.

[136] Qui plus est, le procureur qui fait référence à de la jurisprudence qui n’existe pasrallonge inutilement l’arbitrage. On reproche déjà, souvent avec raison, la longueur etles coûts élevés associés à l’arbitrage de griefs. Ces problèmes seront exacerbés si lesinformations inexactes générées par les hallucinations d’outils d’intelligence artificielles’introduisent devant les tribunaux d’arbitrage en raison de la négligence des procureurs.Le présent cas en est un bon exemple.

[137] Enfin, le procureur qui fait référence à de la jurisprudence inexistante expose lapartie qu’il représente à devoir compenser les dommages que cela pourrait causer àl’autre partie.

[138] En définitive, référer à des décisions qui n’existent pas, comme l’a fait laprocureure patronale dans le présent dossier, est un geste répréhensible qui ne devraitjamais se produire en arbitrage de griefs. Ce comportement est d’autant plus grave quecette procureure est membre de l’Ordre des conseillers en ressources humaines agréés."

[Entry kep in the database for archiving purposes]

It later surfaced that the whole issue might have been human error: see subsequent order.

Show Cause Order here. Law firm explained what happened here.

In the ultimate order, the court noted that "In terms of competence, the threat to attorneys using generative artificial intelligence platforms powered by large language models is two-fold. First, danger exists that the attorney does not understand how the technology functions, believing that the output is real instead of “realistic-looking."."

In finding that the law firm acted with integrity, the Court noted with approval that it had repaid the other side's fees, to the tune of 55,721.2 USD.

Order to Show Cause is here.

Show Cause Order is here.

Misuse of generative AI was later confirmed by the registrar.

"The danger of Attorney Stich’s AI use is especially felt here because his opponent’s pro se status meant that there was not an adversary capable of calling the attention of the court to the phony citations. Furthermore, this court expended time and resources in investigating the hallucinated citations, resources that could have been better spent adjudicating the merits of this underlying litigation and that of other cases pending before this court.

The oversight in submitting fake citations is more than just sloppy lawyering: it imperils the integrity of our judicial process.However, the court also acknowledges that our society sits on the precipice of rapid technological development and that the continued development of AI will fundamentally alter life as we know it. Just as the advent of the Internet in the late 20th century transformed the legal profession, and particularly legal research, so too will artificial intelligence. Indeed, the two biggest legal research databases, Westlaw and LexisNexis, have developed and continue to expand their own proprietary AI tools to assist legal practitioners in finding case law.2 This Order should not be construed as a Luddite attack on technology and the efficiency it brings to the legal profession. Rather, this Order is an acknowledgement that AI remains a nascent technology with questionable reliability at this juncture. Given the ethical obligations lawyers must honor, it is imperative that lawyers use AI with diligence and care. This technology is too unsophisticated and must necessarily yield to a lawyer’s obligation of candor to the court."

From the Order to Show Cause (available here): "One week after filing its second motion for summary judgment, Liberty Mutual submitted a notice of errata identifying the erroneous Goodman and Chaudri citations and demonstrating legitimate citations to those cases. [ECF No. 50].3 While the Court acknowledges Liberty Mutual’s prompt notice disclosing the two most serious errors in its filing, the additional misquotations and mischaracterizations discussed above will not be disregarded. Liberty Mutual indicates that the errors were typographical and/or caused by vision impairment, but that explanation is simply not credible. The errors in Liberty Mutual’s filing are not ones in which a few letters or numbers were passed over or shuffled. Rather, the filing includes entire names, dates, court designations, and Westlaw citations that are completely off base, and various other inaccuracies cannot be explained by typographical or vision issues. Therefore, the Court will reserve its ruling on the motion for sanctions and will set a hearing requiring Liberty Mutual to show cause why it should not be sanctioned."

Later on, the court accepted Counsel's technical audit that suggested the errors stemmed from a human, non-AI source.

Defendants' reply identified fictitious cases, incorrect citations, and non-existent quotations in Plaintiffs' response brief. Plaintiffs filed a Notice of Corrected Citations; the Court noted formatting that suggested use of generative AI but declined to sanction the pro se plaintiffs, advising compliance with Rule 11 in future filings.